Slaves and Soldiers
by AuraWielder
Summary: Entei. Suicune. I've lost them. You don't truly know what it means to have something until it's gone. Then you're captured by Team Rocket and forced to work for them against your will. And I've met quite a ragged band of Pokemon among them: A Typhlosion cyborg, a kindhearted Infernape, and a gadget genius Zekrom. The cards life hands you can change everything you know and love...
1. C'est La Vie

Slaves and Soldiers

Rating: Teen; 13 & up for scenes of

graphic violence and mild language

Chapter 1: C'est la Vie (Such is Life)

* * *

><p><em>"Taken..."<em>

_"Stolen..."_

_"Removed..."_

_"Captured..."_

_"Kidnapped..."_

_"Lost..."_

_"...Gone."_

There were many words to describe what had happened to me. What happened to my life, what happened to my home, and what happened to... us.

* * *

><p>It was just supposed to be a normal day. It was just supposed to be another boring day of waking up at 8:00 in the morning. It was supposed to be a typical day of gathering food and arguing over who gets the head and who gets the rear end of that Stantler we hunted. It was supposed to be another laborious day of guarding Johto and making sure no one killed each other or did anything stupid. That's how it was SUPPOSED to go. Of course, the key words here are 'supposed to be a normal day'. And it turned out to be very far from normal…<p>

Not much longer than an hour ago, I had stormed out of the cave in a furious frenzy after getting into another fight with Entei, one of my counterparts. With his mastery over fire and fierce power, he is considered a very proud and majestic creature, though he can kinda be an ass at times. You see, I'm part of a trio known as 'the legendary beasts' and we have come to be created after our death by a ferocious fire in the Brass Tower (now the Burned Tower) by Ho-Oh, the guardian of the skies (or as we prefer to call her, Mom). Some people have humorously referred to us as 'legendary cats' or 'legendary dogs', possibly because I come from the feline family, yet my water counterpart Suicune has more canine characteristics and Entei is... well, we're not sure what Entei is.

What the funny thing is though, is that I don't even remember what the fight was even about. It doesn't even matter what it was about anymore.

But, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what the fight was about now. Now… it makes no difference. What matter now is that I've been taken away from the ones I call my family.

However… I do remember some of the insults thrown though...

They were horrible words. Despicable insults, low blows, and uncaring attitudes towards each other. I don't ever want to repeat them, not in good company. Feelings were hurt, and even some blood was shed. We're a family. We're supposed to stick together through tough times, and even when we don't get along. We're not supposed to abandon one another. The details? They're a little fuzzy, to be honest...

Then again, you probably wouldn't recall the exact details of a stupid fight either if you were captured by some nutcase from Team Rocket and stuffed inside their truck. I should really tell you how I got myself into this mess.

* * *

><p>It was such an obvious lure. When I had stormed out of the cave, I was so furious, just wanting to murder whatever crossed my path, so I really wasn't thinking twice about where I was going and got myself lost among the forests of Johto. The only thought I remember is that I had wanted Entei to go crawl and die in a hole. Being the moron that I was, I got myself lost among the forests of Johto. Had I been in a more rational and sane mood, I would've noticed something suspicious about a Sandslash, a Rhydon, and a Golem, all gathered up in a forest field and that they were completely out of place.<p>

Man, I want to shoot myself in the head for being such a complete and total moron. Being in the _lovely _mood that I was, I told them to get out of my way or get electrocuted.

And the winner for the dumbest decision of the decade goes to none other than... ME! _Thank you, thank you, I'm SO happy to accept this award!_

...Sigh.

"Golem, use Earthquake!"

I heard the commanding voice from the bushes, though I didn't see anyone. The voice was slightly high-pitched; presuming me to believe it was a woman. Those thoughts didn't stay in my head for long as the Golem launched Earthquake. With me being an Electric-type, I couldn't take the move very well. The earth shook tremendously and knocked me over, causing me to hit the side of my head onto a nearby tree; right on the sharp bark as well, leaving a bloody gash.

I pushed my paws against the ground, slowly supporting myself to stand back up. Whoever this person was knew who they were going after. The only reason you would drag around a bunch of Rock and Ground types is to take down a powerful Electric type, such as myself.

But I'll be damned if they take this Electric type down without a fight.

"Rhydon, use Tackle!"

The Rhydon ran towards me, trying to ram his horn into me. Fortunately, he was pretty slow, so it was easy to dodge him. I retaliated by using some of my limited mental powers to throw an Extrasensory his way. It drove him crazy, and he kept hitting his head repeatedly on a nearby tree to try and get rid of the pain.

The voice then ordered a new command from her Sandslash.

"Sandslash, use Dig!"

The Sandslash obeyed without question and dug into the earth. Since it was in the earth, I had no idea as to what spot on the field and what direction it would come from. I knew that Sandslashs often used their opponent's movements to their advantage. The best solution, I thought, was to stand still.

That certainly didn't change a damn thing.

It emerged directly from under me, painfully piercing my stomach. I screamed in horrifying agony from the blow and blood began gushing out. I hit the ground hard and was completely helpless, lying there like a dead dog.

"No…" I whispered. "I... can't give up. I've… got to… fight."

I tried to stand back up, but the pain was too excruciating. I flopped back down and set my right paw over the thick, long tear on my stomach with the blood seeping through, getting in between the spaces of my fingers.

It was an embarrassment. To be defeated so easily without even having to fight back was humiliating. It was absolutely degrading to me as a Legendary Pokémon. Thinking back at it, I should've just run when I had the chance. I should've just ran back for the cave and never looked back. My entire adventure would never have happened if I just ran for it. But that's one of my problems. I'm just too damn proud for my own good.

The bushes where the voice of authority had emerged began shaking and out came a woman.

She had red hair that went down to shoulder-length, with the sides flipped up. Her dress was mostly white, with black stripes on the rims of her arms and the bottom of the dress. She wore a black belt with a silver lock on it. But I knew immediately who she was upon seeing her uniform.

"Hold up... You're with Team Rocket, aren't you? Your outfit... your logo... that unmistakable smirk on your face and that gleam in your eye... There's no mistaking it..."

She smirked. "For a legendary Pokémon, I was expecting a harder fight. I'm actually wondering if you'll even be of any benefit to Team Rocket."

I groaned. I hated myself SO much at that moment. But there was nothing I could do...

The malicious woman shrugged her shoulders before tossing a standard issue Pokéball at me. The ball tapped my head and bounced in the air. It shot out a beam of red energy at me and transported me into it. With my extremely weakened conditions and inability to fight, I was easily captured.

* * *

><p>You know... I take it all back. It's hard for me to say but I take every word I said to Entei back now. If I had never fought with him in the first place, I wouldn't be stuck here. Both of us are to blame, but I should've stepped up and taken responsibility.<p>

You don't know what you got until it's gone.

Life can be so cruel. It robs lives, ruins spirits, and breaks families. I'm sure most of you can relate.

And now, here I am. Here I am now, trapped in a Pokéball inside a truck. That's not the bad part, actually. The ball was really very comfortable and it had anything a Pokémon would want. A field to run around in (though I couldn't due to my injury), a river to get fresh water from, berries to pick… of course, I wasn't stupid. I knew it was all just a simulation set up by the device to adjust to the captured Pokémon's needs.

Anyway, to get back on track, that wasn't the bad part. The bad part was WHO I was captured by. I have never actually seen the woman who caught me before, but it didn't take a genius to figure out that she was bad business. She was with Team Rocket, who was not to be trusted. Team Rocket has done a lot of evil things that would make most moral human beings sick to their stomach. Some of their smaller crimes were cutting off Slowpoke Tails and selling them to the black market because they're valued as a delicacy and brought in an extremely high profit. But some of their higher-profile crimes were capturing Pokémon, many of them already belonging to other trainers. Most of the time, these Pokémon would never see their trainer again. The Pokémon were forced to work for Team Rocket. Those that refused were brainwashed with high-frequency sound waves.

Fortunately, a couple years ago, a kid; Ethan was his name, had helped saved Johto and the captured Pokémon by defeating and disbanding Team Rocket. I'm pretty sure he also destroyed said brainwashing machine as well.

Or so I thought.

Ethan beat Giovanni at Tohjo Falls by travelling back in time with Celebi to when Giovanni was training there, preventing him from returning to Team Rocket at the time. Many had believed Giovanni committed suicide after his loss against Ethan. It's a plausible theory, but I couldn't believe he was truly dead unless I saw the corpse myself. But if he's still alive, it's safe to assume that he went back to Team Rocket. I don't know if Ethan's still out there and knows Team Rocket rejoined, if he's even trying to stop them, or even if he's on an adventure in another region. At this point, he might not even care anymore.

As for that... abomination of a device, I'm not sure of its status. If they did fix it and I don't comply with them, I can kiss everything I know, as well as my own consciousness and self-existence goodbye.

Such is life, I suppose.

It's still hard to believe that this all happened because of some stupid argument that I don't remember.

Normally, I would be asking myself that out of all the Legendary Pokémon, why did I have to get kidnapped? That question won't change what happened though.

I may become their puppet; I may have to work for the ones I hate and battle the ones I love. I can't be sure of anything. I can be sure of only myself.

Whatever they do to me, whatever they want me to do…

I must keep my head up, stand strong, and I can't let them break me down. And maybe, just maybe...

I'll survive.

* * *

><p>Pokémon © <em>NintendoGame Freak_

Picture of cover (c) SkyWolf11 on deviantART

Please Read and Review. I do want to know your opinions, even offer up a few ideas, I'm open to suggestions. I'm always looking to improve myself, and constructive criticism is helpful. But, please no flaming.


	2. Analysis Pending

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 2: Analysis Pending

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><p>I lay down in the simulated grass of the Pokéball, contemplating my next move once I was out of here. Running away wasn't an option; since I was sure Team Rocket had state-of-the-art security. Even if they didn't, I couldn't, because when a Pokémon is captured, Pokéballs have a kind of 'restraint' that prevents from fleeing too far. The only way to free a Pokémon is to crush the Pokéball, while the Pokémon isn't in it. But that obviously wasn't happening.<p>

So then I thought, what will they do to me? They'll force me to work for them, that was as clear as day. But what will they make me do? Will they force me to steal precious artifacts from museums for a valuable profit? Will they assign me to kidnap other trainer's Pokémon? Or will they relegate me to higher, more important missions, like taking out big figures that threatened Team Rocket's business?

No matter what happened, I had to be prepared. Entei… Suicune… where are you guys…?

I felt my Pokéball being picked up. I couldn't see what was going on but all I could hear was mumbling and footsteps, so whatever was happening, it wasn't very exciting.

They obviously weren't very GENTLE with the Pokéball, tossing it up and down with one hand, like they were just having a good old damn time. They were definitely excited to having caught a legendary, I understand most people are, but it caused a lot of shaking and rumbling in the Pokéball, enough to knock me over and causing me to puke my guts onto the grass.

Eventually, after what seemed like hours but were probably just a couple of minutes, the shaking stopped. "Thank God." I thought to myself.

I heard a click. I knew what that meant. They were ready to let me out of the Pokéball, which I initially presumed was for a battle. I prepared a battle stance, expecting the worst. When the ball opened, I was transformed from energy back into solid matter in the outside world and found myself standing face-to-face in the office of the most evil man the world has known.

Giovanni.

* * *

><p>My eyes and his locked and entered a showdown. Each of us were attempting to pierce into the other's soul. After perhaps a minute or two, he closed his eyes… and smirked. I was ready to strangle him, but it would all be too easy for him to call security and have them tranquillize me. He raised his head, and looked at the woman who had captured me.<p>

"Ariana. I'm actually quite impressed. Capturing the Legendary Raikou was definitely no simple task."

Her eyes then locked on to Giovanni's.

"Please. It really wasn't that difficult." she simply stated. The embarrassing thing is that she was right. I was caught so effortlessly. Had I been more rational at the moment, I would've easily outwitted her and escaped. But unfortunately, that's a thing of the past I can't change.

Giovanni bent his knees down to look at me at eye-level. While looking at me but addressing Ariana, he said;

"You know what to do. Like we do with every other Pokémon, this one is no different. Take him for his physical and testing in the exam room, so we can see his strengths and weaknesses. I'm sure we'll find use for the runt."

A **runt**? That was where I had it with him. Just because this guy was the leader of Team Rocket and owned a multi-billion dollar corporation didn't give him the right to order me around like a house pet and call me a runt!

I couldn't electrocute him, despite how badly I wished to do so. Instead, I settled for the next best alternative.

I **spit** in his face.

That's right. I, Raikou, the Legendary Beast of Thunder, had just thrown my saliva onto the leader of Team Rocket and ultimate Mafia Boss, Giovanni. And let me tell you, it felt **GREAT**! That bloody bastard had it coming to him. The man wasn't even worthy of my saliva. That was one of the best things I've ever done. Of course, doing that would have drastic consequences…

Ariana glanced at her boss nervously, afraid of Giovanni's possible wrath. To try to make things better (for them) she nervously offered,

"You… want me to help you clean that up?"

What surprised me is that Giovanni didn't lose his cool, like I had expected him to. Normally, people don't care to be spit in the face.

And then…he grinned. Sadistically. As if he was ready to do unspeakable things… Whatever he had in planning for me now, it was going to be BAD.

"No. After you're done with the examination and testing, take him to the Garchomps' chamber to spend the night. He **will **learn to respect authority."

"Yes sir."

"You may leave now."

Ariana had thrown the Pokéball at me, trapping me inside the virtual simulation yet again. I lied down on the grass near a 'river' to get a drink of water 'cause my throat was parched. I heard her take her leave and was left to ponder what 'examinations' Giovanni meant. I knew Team Rocket wasn't above torturing Magikarps to force them to evolve. I knew Team Rocket wasn't above performing horrific crimes of kidnapping and murder. Team Rocket was capable of anything and I knew anything could happen.

At this point, I wonder if Entei and Suicune know I'm gone…

* * *

><p>When I emerged from my Pokéball this time, I found myself in a white room with 1 long glass window, no furniture, and no nothing except for 4 walls, a ceiling, a floor, and 1 door; all white.<p>

I've heard tales of people who have gone insane by staying in these kinds of rooms for days, weeks, and even months. But I knew that's not what they had planned. Why would anyone capture a Legendary Pokémon, just to try to drive it to absolute insanity?

I looked through the window to see if anyone was there, but I couldn't see anything at all, and guessed it was one of those 'one-way' windows, like they use at police stations to have someone identify a criminal.

I was still wondering why I was put into this room when a gray claw descended from the ceiling, and enclosed a portion of my stomach and back. Said claw then extended to cover the entirety of my stomach and back, leaving holes for my legs. I shuddered at the contact with the cold inside of the… 'armor' shall we say. I realized this was the 'physical' and since I wouldn't have done this willingly, Team Rocket used devices to restrain me.

The claw dragged me back to the exact center of the room, set me at ground level, and then long metal gray-whitish boots ascended from the floor to encase my feet, so I couldn't kick with them when they would examine me. They were cold too, and I could feel electrical circuits buzzing through the boots, due to my sensitivity to them as an Electric type.

A giant leather strap emerged from the ceiling and encased itself around my neck, not only preventing me from turning it, but it was also very itchy from the inside, and I could feel the fur of other Pokémon restrained by this device as well.

Finally, one more device descended from the ceiling. A tooth restrain. To make sure I couldn't bite them during the 'physical'. I tried to keep my mouth shut so it couldn't be inserted, but the device crammed its way into my mouth and jacked up like how you would jack a car to put in a new tire. My mouth was forced open, revealing my white, fierce teeth (which I admit, I always had very well-kept). Said device also kept me from chomping and closing them down.

Humiliating would have been the absolute understatement of the year to describe how I felt. Never before was I at the complete and total mercy of any being. To be in this situation, and not knowing what they'll do to you, what will happen… it's scary. No, that's not it… Terrifying is a better word to use. I have never been so terrified in my life. If Entei and Suicune saw me like this, they would be completely horrified.

I tried to break out. I tried to move my teeth off of the metal frame they were kept in. I tried to shake off the itchy, hot, uncomfortable leather strap around my neck. I tried to yank my feet out from the metal boots. And I furiously launched an Electric attack to try and break the armor off. But it was all to no avail. I was so... helpless. And I hardly ever do, and don't tell Entei and Suicune but... I cried.

I brought great shame upon myself and my trio.

Once the necessary 'restraints' were in place, a Team Rocket Grunt came out through the single solitary door the room had, along with a man in a lab coat who was, from the looks of it, an important doctor. I blinked rapidly to get rid of my tears. I wasn't going to let anyone here see me break down.

The Team Rocket Grunt quickly left and I was left alone with the doctor. In his hands, he had a clipboard for probably writing things about me down.

He looked at me with a bored expression on his face and proceeded to… 'analyze' me.

I tried to numb the intense emotion of anxiety flowing through me by thinking about things I liked. I closed my eyes and pictured myself running through a field, jumping in the air and chasing the butterflies as if I were a young cub again. The flowers in the field were blooming and showing their beauty; not minding one bit as I leapt in the air and landed on them. They sprung back to life as I continued jumping in the air and rolling on the field and...

I was brought out of my thoughts when I heard a click, as if he had pressed some sort of button. I felt the 'armor' that was on me morph back into a claw and heard it ascend back up the ceiling. With that thing off I didn't feel as helpless, but I still really couldn't do anything. His arm, covered with a rubber glove, skimmed over my fur and then I felt him depress his hands into my skin. It felt, not painful really just… incredibly awkward.

"Body composition (aka fat-to-muscle) ratio is about… 10 to 90%. Healthy and excellent condition." he muttered.

His hand grabbed onto my right front leg and he squeezed it. Hard; I winced slightly.

"Muscles are incredibly toned and well suited for speed and power."

Lastly, he looked at my teeth as they were forced open. He stared at them and even began to touch them.

"Fantastic molars! Beautiful, just beautiful, and excellent for biting into prey."

He seemed genuinely surprised at the condition of my teeth, but what was so surprising about it? I just took good care of them and always made it a priority to brush them every day like anyone else.

I still wanted to bite his hand off as he moved his hand uncomfortably through my mouth. Thankfully, he finally took them out.

"Yep. You'll make a fine soldier." he grinned.

He finished writing some notes onto his clipboard then backed away a slight distance and took out a strange remote which looked like something you'd use to control the TV and pressed two buttons. Two of my restraints were released; the leather-neck restraint and the metal frame tooth restraint. It felt better to have those things off, but the metal boots on my feet remained, so I still couldn't move.

I turned my head to his direction and he had a small pack in his hands, which he zipped open and took out my Pokéball. He tossed the Pokéball and I groaned as the ball transformed me from matter into energy again and I was back in my virtual 'paradise'.

* * *

><p>I wondered where I was going now, with that damn physical out of the way. Giovanni mentioned a physical exam <em>and <em>testing. After a small bit of thinking, I remembered he wanted to test my powers and see how I could be of 'use' to him. And by 'use', I mean exploit my powers for the benefit of stupid freakin' Team Rocket. Since I knew battling was next, I prepared myself for whatever Team Rocket had in store for 'testing'.

Eventually, I felt the ball shake and open. I transformed back from energy into matter and landed on a cold, concrete floor. I tried to look around and there was only darkness as far as the eye could see. Suddenly, the lights flipped on and I found myself in some sort of Pokémon battle arena. Usually, during these kinds of fights, seats would be stuffed with many different Pokémon trainers, breeders, coordinators, and anyone else who wanted to watch a good fight. But this was a practice arena. I could tell since there weren't even seats for an audience to sit in.

I was on the right side of the stage while none other than Mr. Giovanni himself was on the left. Seems he wanted to test me himself. The spitting in his face probably had something to do with it.

He had three Pokéballs total; one in his left hand and two in his right. He tossed all 3 in the air and shouted;

"Nidoking, Rhydon, and Kangaskhan, come out!"

Thrown from the ball in his left hand, Nidoking came out. From the ones in his right hand; Rhydon and Kangaskhan emerged.

"Here are your requirements." he addressed me. "Bring down all three Pokémon, two of them you have type disadvantage to. If you manage to defeat all 3 of my prized Pokémon, I might just be impressed enough to pardon your actions towards me earlier."

"And if I fail?" I growled.

Giovanni's famous smirk reappeared. "Fail, and you'll be spending a night with the Garchomps."

It was my turn to smirk now. "Mr. Giovanni, you have yourself a deal."

"I thought I would."

Giovanni turned to his Pokémon Nidoking.

"Nidoking, use Poison Sting!" he ordered.

Nidoking charged forward and his right claw glowed purple, signifying that he was going to use the demanded attack. I dodged it as he swiped, and ran behind him. I ditched the electric attacks for him, since he was part Ground. Instead, I crunched my fangs into his back, causing him to scream in pain. Blood spewed from his back onto the concrete floor. I kept my fangs in and sunk deeper to hurt him further.

"Kangaskhan, attack Raikou with Dizzy Punch!" Giovanni commanded.

The Kangaskhan did as told, and she leapt forward and rapidly threw punches at me. The force knocked me off of Nidoking and back onto the cold concrete.

I shook my head and stood back up. "Two against one now, huh? All right, then…"

This time, I went after Kangaskhan. She was Normal-type, but I had no Fighting moves, so I launched my most powerful Electric attack at her. I Thundered her into oblivion and knocked her out instantly.

"That only leaves two more…" I lost concentration on the battle for only a few seconds which Giovanni exploited.

"Rhydon, hit him with Fissure!"

_"Uh oh." _I realized. _"If Fissure makes contact, I'm a goner!"_

Giovanni left me no time to react as the unexpectedly fast Rhydon had already reached me. Unlike Ariana's, Giovanni's Rhydon was much faster and much more well trained. He had the element of surprise, and successfully KO'd me with the attack.

I lied down on the concrete floor, simply struggling to keep my eyes open, but failing as they eventually closed. Before I drifted into unconsciousness, I heard him say, "Somewhat of a disappointment. You did all right, though. Oh well, say hello to the Garchomps for me."

* * *

><p>I regained consciousness in what eerily resembled one of those creepy old prison chambers from the 1800's. I was amazed I could stand up with no trouble, but then I rationalized he just healed me.<p>

I looked around cautiously and walked forward slowly. My eyes focused on two tiny evil beady yellow eyes in the darkness. The eyes slowly began to inch forward and I stepped back. They came forward, I stepped back. This continued until I noticed that the number of eyes doubled from two to four. When I finally could back up no further, the four beady eyes revealed themselves to be two terrifying, towering, and drooling Garchomps.

I sighed. This was going to be a long night.

"I hate my life."

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon<em> © _Nintendo/Game Freak_

Oh boy, poor Raikou has been left for the Garchomps, hope he lives... Then again, if he didn't we would have a very short story, wouldn't we?


	3. CyberTy Model 002

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 3: Cyber-Ty Model #002

* * *

><p>"Suicune. It's getting late."<p>

"We can't stop now."

Back in the forest where Raikou, Entei, and Suicune resided, only the latter two were still there, looking for the thunder tiger after he disappeared yesterday and hadn't returned by nightfall. It's been several hours since they started searching and there was still no sign of him.

"This is your fault."

"Suicune…"

"If you guys had never gotten into a fight over whose turn it was to check the cities for trouble, this never would've happened. Entei, if Ho-Oh finds out, she'll never forgive you."

"…Suicune." Entei comforted her. "I know. I'm taking the guilt and blame. It's my fault. I mean, in retrospect, arguing over who was Mom's favorite was kinda stupid. Raikou just needed time to vent. The moron probably just got lost."

Suicune shook her head. "I don't know. Something just tells me… You know, one of those gut feelings… that something bad happened to him."

"…You mean you think he caught by a trainer?" The fire lion pondered.

"Maybe. I'm not sure. But I know something's wrong, so we have to…"

"Suicune." Entei declared with a firm, yet calm and reassuring voice.

"…Yes?"

"Look at me."

"Why?"

"Just look at me."

"Well… fine, I guess."

Suicune turned her body around to face Entei. She stood up as he took a long good look of her eyes. He quickly noticed though, that her eyes were bloodshot from a horrible lack of sleep. Some drool was leaking out of her mouth and her entire body was shaking and she simply had a hard time keeping her body up.

"Suicune. Your body is in a deplorable condition. I have to get you back to the cave."

"But I'm not…"

"If it makes you feel any better, I'll keep looking for Raikou after I get you back. All right?"

Suicune sighed. She walked over a bit to a small creek nearby. As she looked into the water, she saw her reflection. She was indeed in a pitiful condition and she felt ashamed.

"The embodiment of the Northern Winds shouldn't look like this."

Entei came to her and put one of his paws on her back. Her fur was still as smooth as silk yet as soft as cotton. "Relax." he told her. "Just let me take you back to the cave, and I'll take care of it."

The blue wolf nodded as she let the Volcano Pokémon take her back.\

* * *

><p>It was official.<p>

Last night was **the** worst night of my **entire** life, **bar none**. Yes, even worse that the night of Lugia's millennial birthday party, when Entei spiked the punch without me knowing and challenged me to drink the entire bowl.

_Chug! Chug! Chug! Chug!_

**Worst. Hangover. Ever.**

But that's beside the point. Those Garchomps mauled, slashed, and pounded me into oblivion. Blood poured out from my mouth, and through the scars on my back and stomach. Their saliva had gotten all over my body when they chomped on me. I couldn't move from my curled-up position from the ground. Put simply, I was definitely a horror to behold. I was fortunate enough that they had become bored of toying around with me and decided to go back to sleep.

That stupid Giovanni had wanted me to learn a 'lesson about respecting authority', but I haven't changed my opinion of him one bit. I still despised him with every bone in my body. But I knew if I wanted to live, then I would have to obey his every command. Not an experience I was looking forward to…

What kind of 'jobs' did Team Rocket have in mind? I was a powerful Legendary, so most likely big profile jobs. I could only anxiously wait for when they come for me. I was able to turn my head to look out one of the windows in the chamber.

"It's daylight now, so someone will probably be here soon…"

No later than I had said that; I heard the door to this chamber open and footsteps come down the stairway.

_"Is it Giovanni? Or just your run-of-the-mill Rocket Grunt?"_

No, it couldn't be Giovanni. The footsteps were way too shaky and noisy to belong to him. Giovanni was always the three C's: calm, cool and collected. He never showed any kind of fear or hesitation. Fear and hesitation, though, were the exact vibes I was getting from this guy.

I decided I should get a look at this grunt. I slowly, yet surely, stood up with my front paws and turned my neck to get a peek at this dude.

…Let me tell you, this man… no, man isn't the right word; he seemed more like a young child… this child… was the by-the-book, Encyclopedia Britannica definition of pitiful. To be honest, I felt a little… well… a little sorry for him and **I **was the one who got kidnapped! His legs wouldn't stop shaking, as if they were going to give up on him and turn into grape jelly. His teeth chattered like a drill at a construction site and at such an insane speed that I concurred that he was grinding them down. Perhaps the most repulsive thing though was his sweat. He was sweating more than an Emboar at a sauna! The smell though… it was unbearable. I thought I was going to collapse just from that stench alone.

He wasn't even doing anything. Just standing there like he would wet his pants at any given moment. Not that anyone would notice with him sweating so profusely. I was wondering, 'Why in the hell did they send **this guy?**'

I was growing bored. I decided to try and make small talk. "Are you actually going to do something or just pee in your pants?"

I was met with a shrill shriek that sounded like it belonged to an 8 year old girl who just saw a Galvantula, and not to a 23 year old man.

"Thank you," I said, with venomous sarcasm. "For permanently damaging my ear drums."

"So who are you, anyway?"

"L-L-Le-Les-L-L-L-…"

I groaned. I was expecting to be sent to my Pokéball, healed, and be shipped off to whatever Giovanni wanted me to do, and not get caught up with a guy who had serious stuttering problems and really needed anxiety medications.

"L-L-Lll-Le-Les-L-Leslie."

"…Leslie?" I asked again for confirmation.

He nodded.

I tried to resist the urge to lose myself in the moment and laugh like a moron on ecstasy. Unfortunately (actually, rather fortunately), I failed. Hey, I was kidnapped from my family and brought here against my will. Then some wimp named Leslie comes to get me, freaked out of his poor mind. They say laughter is the best medicine. I might as well take the drug.

"S-S-Stop laughing! P-P-Please?"

_"Maybe I should be nice to the guy." _I thought. _"After all, it's not his fault he got a girl's name."_

"Heh heh heh. All right, all right. I'm done." I told him.

"You sure?"

"…Wait."

I promptly burst back into laughter for 5 continuous seconds, attempting to get it out of my system. The laughing was actually useful for ignoring the pain the Garchomps gave me. Eventually, I rose back up.

"Ok. Now I'm done. For real."

The girl—I mean, guy took out a Pokéball. Knowing it was mine; he threw the ball, it hit me, and yadda yadda yadda.

As he walked out of the Garchomp's chamber and to… wherever he was taking me, I came to a heartbreaking realization.

_"Entei and Suicune aren't saving me. Not because they don't want to; quite the opposite, but because they had no idea where to look. They don't know where I went. They don't know what happened. They don't know who captured me or even if I was captured at all! They don't know anything and they aren't coming."_

* * *

><p>Flashback:<p>

_"So what's new with you?" asked Entei._

_"Nothing much. Johto's having one of those peaceful boring days, plus it's raining and you know I hate getting my fur wet, so there's nothing to do." I replied._

_"Nothing to do, huh?"_

_"Yeah."_

_The duo were looking out into the harsh rainy day from the comfort of their warm cave. There was nothing for them to do except sit and wait it out. Suicune, being a Water-type loved the rain and was jumping around happily like a puppy._

_"Suicune sure looks happy, huh?" I noted._

_"She sure does." Entei answered._

_Silence fell again. But for only a few minutes before Entei spoke up again._

_"You know, you say there's nothing to do while it's raining, right?"_

_"Yeah."_

_"Sometimes, having nothing to do at all can be quite nice."_

_"How so?" I asked him. It didn't really make much sense to me._

_"This is just a moment in time I relish. When there's nothing to do or keep you busy and you can just stop and enjoy yourself. Take a moment to slow down and..."_

_I promptly fell asleep in the middle of his musing Entei did have a tendency to blab on and on about things._

_Entei chuckled. "You always go to sleep when I have something philosophical to say."_

End Flashback

* * *

><p><em>"What I wouldn't give for another one of those moments..."<em>

It was a hard fact to accept. We were like family, always having each other's backs and watching out for each other. We got on each other's nerves and drove each other crazy. We took care of each other and we were a team that could never been split up… until now.

_"Entei… Suicune… I'll really miss you guys."_

* * *

><p>I didn't have long to mourn over my situation. I was sent out from my Pokéball back to the real world. Expecting a battle, I found in the middle of… a break room?<p>

As soon as the wimp released me, he stuttered, "Y-Y-You're s-supposed to s-st-stay here un-until G-Giovanni c-calls for y-you." After that, he immediately dashed out and ran as if his life depended on it. I took this chance to scan around the small room.

There wasn't much to say, honestly. The small, rectangular room has few things to say about it. In the center of the room was a small, square wooden table with a coffee machine on it (but why in the hell would Pokémon drink coffee?). On the wall to the right of the door I had come in, a linoleum counter expanded over the whole wall, with a few wooden cabinets below. There was nothing special to note on the wall opposite of me, except an analog clock. On the wall of the door, there was nothing except the… well, the door. On the left wall was something of interest, though. On the left wall were a very small coffee table and a couch. Sitting on the couch, though, was a Pokémon.

I studied him from a distance I deemed safe. I recognized it was a Typhlosion (they're common seen in the possession of trainers in Johto), but he was, well… odd. And by odd, I mean HALF OF HIS FREAKING BODY WAS METAL.

His right paw was not a paw at all, but a METAL CLAW. The lower arm was a thin, high-tech metal, but the upper arm was organic. On his back was a metallic round backpack of sorts that looked like it was attached to his body. A large black insulated wire protruded from the top of the pack into, not onto, INTO his head. His eye, his right eye… was creepy, to say the least. The pupil shined like metal… because it WAS metal. The iris glowed red, like the color red that evil robots' eyes glowed in those sci-fi shows. His left eye was normal though. Almost the entire left chest and abdomen parts revealed bits and pieces of high-tech metal making up his body. His cybernetics looked like that they came straight out of Tron.

Just looking at this guy made me feel uneasy. Whether this was a result of Team Rocket's experimentation or some sort of cybernetic surgery, I didn't know. I've seen all the sci-fi shows where cyborgs often go all crazy and attack people and kill anything living. But maybe that wasn't a very good basis to judge a cyborg on. But I did wonder to myself; was he a friend or was he a foe?

He seemed to notice me analyzing him and looked over at me. "Well, you wanna sit down? There's an extra space."

I didn't say anything half out of nervousness and half out of simply not knowing what to say.

He grinned. Not smirked, but genuinely grinned. It was nice to finally see a true smile on someone in here, regardless of who he was.

"Don't worry. I don't bite." he assured. "Too hard." Then he chuckled a bit.

_"Maybe I'll like this guy." _I mentally debated.

I sat down next to him, wanting to know more about him… and more about this place too.

"So let's start off with introductions." he said. "Who are you?"

I smirked. "I am Raikou, the Legendary Beast of Electricity here in the flesh and at your presence."

"Legendary Beast, huh? Part of the trio? Then where are the other two?"

I began to explain my situation, from my kidnapping to here in this break room, and everything in between.

"What sucks the most," I told the Typhlosion. "Is that I lost my family and I may never see them again."

"Well, don't worry. You'll get used to it." he tried to console me… and horribly failing. His metal claw moved over and touched my paw. The contact with the cold metal surprised me, but I didn't move my paw off. "It's not all bad. I mean, we get 3 square meals a day, free lounge time after we're done with missions, our own rooms, and all we have to do is…"

"Obey their every command?" I growled. I don't care if he's tried to comfort me. I'm in a bad situation with no way out. I indistinctively clutched my paws with his sharp metal claws, causing them to penetrate my skin and bleed slightly.

He fell silent. I couldn't help but feel a little suspicious of him. He didn't seem to be fazed at working for Team Rocket. Was he on their side? I figured it was my turn to ask him questions.

"Guess I'll go. Who exactly are you and why…" I gestured at his body, and he understood the implication.

"I'm a Typhlosion. Cyborg Model #002. I've been here for a long time, almost my whole life."

"Almost?"

"Yes, I remember some memories of when I was a Cyndaquil. I actually had a trainer many years ago, but I didn't have him long."

"You know who he was?" I asked curiously.

"I did. At least, I think I did at one point or another. You see, as a Cyndaquil, I was captured like you. I tried desperately to escape here, but to no avail. Eventually, I gave hope seeing him again, but I didn't forget him. While I was here, I evolved from a Cyndaquil into the next form, Quilava. As a Quilava, Team Rocket decided I could be sent on harder, more dangerous missions. They stole my Pokéball as well during the capture, so I legally couldn't be caught. I couldn't try to flee while I was on an assignment either. They equip you with tracking devices…" Typhlosion showed me a dull gray anklet on his leg. "…So you can't get far. One mission took me to the Power Plant in Kanto, along with another partner. It was regular duty to capture Pokémon and bring them to Team Rocket. But one Pikachu's attack… one damned Pikachu's Volt Tackle was too much for me to handle. The attack, my partner said, burned off my left lower arm and my left body off, and well as rendering my right eye useless. I would have died if they didn't give me robotic implants. Team Rocket was worried that when I evolved, the implants would be rejected. But, I evolved into Typhlosion and nothing happened."

"But your memory?" I inquired again.

"…I'm not sure, but I think it could've been overwritten during implantation. It... happens, I guess."

"…That sucks, dude. I feel sorrier for you than me, now."

"Don't sweat it. And don't feel sorry for me. I've just grown to accept this whole deal as part of life. Stuff happens, things change… and you have to know how to adapt to it and just... accept it and not deny the truth of what's happening. But sometimes... I have to question myself on these kinds of things. The truth is hard to accept sometimes..."

I began to speak up. "I never asked, do you have a nickname or..."

"Nah, didn't get one. Just call me Ty. Some here have dubbed me Cyber-Ty, though."

"...What did you mean by 'Model #002'? Was there one before you?"

Typhlosion faltered slightly. "Well... yeah. A Charizard was the first model Team Rocket made, and I don't much about him, but what I do know is that things didn't go well with him. He had to be... shut down."

"Shut... down?"

"The process of shutting down a cyborg, from what I've researched is similar to shutting down a computer... except...it's..." Ty began to drone.

I looked at him. Fear was evident on his face. It was easy to guess that being 'shut down' was probably like being put down. An event no Pokémon looked forward to. I decided to change the subject.

"Never mind that." I muttered. "But what do we do now?"

"We just wait. There's nothing we can really do about it."

"Like slaves and soldiers," I whispered, barely audible. "Waiting for their master's orders..."

_I could only wonder what Team Rocket would have Typhlosion and I do._

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © NintendoGame Freak_

Cyber-Ty was a fun character for me to design. Can't really think of many people who did a cyborg Typhlosion, I just thought the idea was cool. Cyber-Ty's bio can be found on my profile page. He's also the first OC I've designed, so if there's something Mary Sue-ish about him, PLEASE TELL ME. In the later chapters, his weaknesses will show though.

_Cyber-Ty (c) AuraWielder_

YES! I OWN SOMETHING!


	4. The Crazy Caped Man

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 4: The Crazy Caped Man

* * *

><p>Not long after Typhlosion and I finished our little conversation, an official-looking Team Rocket member came in and locked the door behind him. Unlike the poor excuse for a bad guy who brought me in earlier, this guy was significantly more menacing.<p>

He wore a white long-sleeved V-neck shirt with black cuffs on the wrists, similar to Ariana. On the left upper chest of his shirt was none other than a Team Rocket logo. It was the exact same logo on Ariana's uniform, so it was a safe assumption that he was the same rank as her; an Executive. His pants were nothing special; just your average white khakis supported with a black belt. But his hair… it was… blue. I can't seem to understand it. Why does every evil Team member have to dye their hair a bizarre color? Red, blue, purple… Next thing I know, it'll be stripes and stars!

…Anyway.

"So, Ariana actually managed to capture you, huh?" he knelt down at me. "Never thought she was capable of that…"

_"So who's this douche?" _I asked Typhlosion while keeping my eyes on the blue-haired human, using a string of Raikous to communicate with him, so the human couldn't understand.

_"That's Archer." _Ty explained to me using strings of Typhlosion._ "He's an Executive of Team Rocket. He's essentially Giovanni's second in command, and took care of Team Rocket while Giovanni was away. Now, of course, Giovanni's back…"_

_"But what does he want with me?"_

_"He's going to do the same thing to you that he did to me when I was a Cyndaquil; put on a tracking device so they know where you are at all times during a mission so you can't escape. It... also injects... painful drugs in your system if you try to defy the Team. Do yourself a favor and don't try to run for it. I tried that. It'll only make things worse for you."_

When Ty explained that to me, I recalled my night with the Garchomps and I NEVER wanted to go through that again. But...

Archer pulled a small, metal anklet with a Team Rocket logo on it from his back pocket and appeared to be calibrating it. Finally, he pushed a small button on the inside of the anklet and it snapped open. He seemed to be hesitating to put it on me and I knew exactly why.

"Go ahead." I said to him using English. "I won't put up a fight."

He eyed me suspiciously and didn't seem to want to trust me. Though to be honest, I understood where he was coming from. Most captives would try to make a desperate escape at this point, but I knew it was no use since security at Team Rocket HQ was seriously tight.

Still hesitating a bit, he slowly maneuvered his left arm around my front right leg and his right arm between my front legs. He secured the device into place on my ankle and quickly snapped it shut.

_Now I'm trapped into this._

"Wow." he stated plainly. "I was expecting I'd have to wrestle you down to the ground and get my uniform messed up. You saved me some hassle and yourself some pain."

He stood back up and unlocked the door using a keycard.

"Come. You and Typhlosion will follow me."

I didn't want to go. My freedom was taken away from me by one careless mistake, and the tracking device just sealed the deal. I had to kiss goodbye my chances of ever seeing my family again.

Typhlosion didn't disobey Archer. He stepped ahead of me and behind the man. He turned to me with forgiving eyes.

_"Come on Raikou, it'll be all right." _he comforted me in the Pokémon language. I sighed to myself and reluctantly, I followed.

It was a quiet walk. Except for me, Archer, and Ty, no one was in the wide, white-walled, floor tiled halls. Not even Archer's footsteps made any sound, and the complete lack of sound was deafening itself. I was left to my thoughts once more as we followed Archer through the halls, twisting and turning, copying his every step.

_"As Typhlosion said, I can't deny the reality of what's happening. He's been here for years and has seemed to accept being here… but… I can't. There has to be some other way out. Some way Ty hasn't tried yet. I-I can't really be here for rest of my life! …Can I?"_

My mind was a raging sea of emotions. One wave was a tide of anger; that I was stupid enough to get caught in the first place. A whirlpool of confusion; being unfamiliar with my surroundings left me with no clue as to what to do. Tears of the sky as my sorrow and regret; that wherever I try to look for a place to escape, there was none. And now I wished I could rewind time to prevent this from happening at all. But time is Celebi's and Dialga's power, not mine. Finally, not a typhoon, not a whirlpool, not even a wave, but… one small ripple of fear haunted me. That Team Rocket had total control over me… that I must do whatever I'm ordered was… a horrifying thought.

I had no choice now. I have to deal with it. Stand up to it. Endure it. They can do whatever; put me on dangerous missions, keep me in horrible conditions, force me to obey or anything else, but they can NEVER… never… take away my burning desire to be free and escape. Not just me, but Typhlosion and anyone else in here.

I must not have been paying attention to where I was walking because just as I finished my thoughts, I hit my head into something HARD.

"Yeowch!" I stumbled back and landed on my rear end. I looked up and noticed I had bumped into a metal table on its side.

I rubbed my head softly. "Least it isn't bleeding…" I mumbled to myself.

It was only right then did I take notice of my surroundings. The room I was in was small and square, not much larger than a public restroom. The walls were a very boring and dull gray. Just looking at it made you sleepy. What kept me up was a lamp on the table I had bonked my head on. Not the lamp that you put shades on, but the thin, long kind you would often use for reading at night. On the table, under the lamp was a packet of paper.

I heard Typhlosion beginning to snicker. But instead of barking at him, I asked, "What are those papers in the middle for?"

His metal claw extended onto the packet of paper and he began to elaborate. "These are assignment sheets. They list every Pokémon who takes on missions for Team Rocket by type, sub-type, then alphabetically. Next to your name is the mission you're to take on. Successful accomplishments get you more attention around here and more privileges."

"What kind of 'privileges' are you talking about?"

"Access to better foods at meal-times, more chances to socialize with other Pokémon here, and less harsh punishments whenever you screw up. They're little things that go a long way."

"…What if you refuse to do something?" I asked. "Like what they ask you to do something that violates your code of ethics?"

"I've gotten a few assignments like that before. One mission called me to assassinate someone, a private investigator, who was close to exposing a black market scam Team Rocket was pulling."

"…You mean Looker? I… read up in the newspaper a few weeks ago that he was killed with a shotgun at his house… Did you really…"

"They asked me to take that mission. I can steal stuff, kidnap other Pokémon from their trainers, even kill… but I refused to kill someone like Looker who was just trying to do what was good for Johto. An Infernape here, he goes by Victor, took that one instead. He and I are the only Pokémon experienced with firearms. Fortunately, I got off easy since I hadn't previously declined assignments. But if you're stubborn and keep refusing… well, I don't really know what happens. I've seen some Pokémon get taken away… but I don't know what Team Rocket does with them."

"…" I remained silent. I already knew that I would have to conform under Team Rocket's command. Fortunately, Ty seemed to realize that I already had the message.

"Let's just go ahead and see what we have to do today, all right?" he suggested.

His right claw clenched the packet of paper, and he flipped through it until he reached 'F' for 'Fire Types', I presumed.

Ty muttered to himself. "T, T, Typhlosion, Typhlosion- ah, there it is."

He began to read aloud. "Assignment K-#4652. Partner: Raikou. Retrieve the Enigma Stone, a stone rumored to be linked to the Eon Pokémon, Latios and Latias, from the Pewter Museum of Science. Use stealth and avoid attracting any attention. Directions to the Pewter Museum have already been wirelessly distributed into your internal GPS."

Typhlosion reached his hand to his metallic looking backpack and hit a small blue button on the side. Almost immediately, his metal chest (the left half) opened up and a small electronic screen (I would say it looked like a PC tablet) attached to a small metal wire, about the size of a box of markers, slowly maneuvered its way out and conveniently in front of Ty's face. I staggered back sharply, a little bit freaked out.

"Don't worry." he assured. "This gives me a big edge over other Pokémon here."

He moved his left organic paw over the apparently touch-operated screen as his right claw supported it. I watched him push an on-screen button and lines suddenly generated themselves from nowhere; over routes stretching from Johto to Kanto.

"All right, Raikou. The routes we're taking are set up and stored in my internal memory." He pushed the same button that brought the touch-screen out and the machine automatically maneuvered itself back into his chest and closed.

"…"

Typhlosion looked at me, puzzled at my facial expression.

"…Yeah. What is it?"

"…You know," I stated. "…that was actually kind of awesome."

"Really?" he asked, genuinely surprised. "No one ever used 'awesome' to describe that before. 'Weird' and 'freaky' I've heard hundreds of times… but 'awesome'… is definitely a first."

"It really is! I mean, it's not every day you get to meet a freakin' cyborg! If I had an internal GPS, I'd get lost a lot less often! It's, it's really kind of cool! How tricked out are you?"

Typhlosion was blushing and was as red as a tomato. He held his metal claw over his neck and scratched it nervously. "Stop it, Raikou. You're embarrassing me…"

"Oh. Heh heh. Sorry…" I chuckled awkwardly.

"Hakuna Matata. It actually feels kind of good to be proud of both halves of me. Hey Raikou, could you turn around?"

"Is this a trick?"

"No. There should be a shelf behind you with some battery packs on it." True to his word, the packs were indeed on a shelf behind me.

"Toss me one of those. In case something happens to my main battery, I want a backup to be safe."

I did as he asked and he put the battery into his pack.

"Backup battery?" I wondered.

"There's been a time when on an assignment, the battery installed in the bottom of that pack got punctured. It rarely happens, due to the fact that the battery is installed in a very sturdy and enclosed chamber but it can still happen. Fortunately, I could swap it out and my cyborg parts were as good as new. So, that's just to be safe."

I nodded, acknowledging his information.

"…You ready?" he asked me.

"Better now than never." I sighed.

"Much better."

* * *

><p>Back at the beasts' cave, Suicune was up after a much needed rest. She felt a lot better too than yesterday in her unhealthy panic-stricken condition and was actually quite glad Entei nagged at her to get some rest. Looking at her beautiful reflection in the cave's pool; she was feeling refreshed and ready to begin the hunt for Raikou… again.<p>

Except for one small problem.

"Suicune? Where are you?"

Her eyes widened. She recognized that voice immediately. It was the voice of the man who was absolutely OBSSESSED with her, and had been tracking (stalking) Suicune for over a decade, Eusine. She knew him all too well. Eusine would anything, and I mean ANYTHING, to capture Suicune. She was previously caught, by Ethan along with the other members of her trio, but he had released them. It was both good and bad. Good because they were free to roam Johto… and bad because she was now fair game for Eusine. At first, Suicune found his obsession slightly amusing. Now, she wanted to rip the man's head off. Unfortunately, Ho-Oh had given them strict rules when she had them guard Johto. Said rules included, "Unless your life is in danger, you are forbidden to kill any humans." And that included Eusine.

Suicune didn't really want to disobey Ho-Oh's orders. But another part of her just wanted to screw the rules over, rip out Eusine's carotid artery and call it a day.

"Suicune? Where are you at? I wish to marvel at your beauty!"

She groaned. The wolf was NOT in the mood to deal with the moron. It wasn't a convenient time either; she and Entei still needed to find Raikou. Suicune considered her options.

If he came into the cave, Suicune could easily sneak out and lose him.

Or…

If he came into the cave, Suicune could murder him, bury the body somewhere, and pray that no one ever found out.

"Suicune? I know you're here somewhere!"

She was leaning very closely towards the latter…

She heard Eusine's footsteps approaching the cave and she realized that sneaking out wasn't an option (unfortunately, neither was killing him). That left only one choice.

HIDE. AND FAST.

Thinking quickly, she dove into the only place she could hide in this cave… the cave's pool. As the pool's tides died down from the wolf's sudden rush into them, Eusine found his way into the small cavern. From the blurry image the water provided, Suicune couldn't see Eusine at all, only hear him. Aside from his usual attire, on his belt were two Pokéballs. One a regular ball; but the other… was a Master.

"Suicune?"

Suicune could only hope Eusine didn't stay in here for too long. She may have mastery over water, but that didn't mean she had gills. She could hold her breath for several minutes underwater and she hoped Eusine would leave within that time.

Eusine began his hunt. He began to look around the cavern, though there was much to look at in the sparse cave; he analyzed the cave and checked under and behind rocks. It had been about 8 minutes since he came in and he was just about to leave.

Suicune's lungs couldn't take it anymore.

_"AIR! AIR! AIR!" _they screamed. She swam back up to the water and she popped out of the water, gasping and panting loud enough to wake the dead… as well as attract Eusine's attention. He turned around and saw his lifelong love- I mean the creature whom he had been searching for over a decade, the Aurora Pokémon Suicune.

"Oh crap." were the first words Eusine had ever heard her speak.

Eusine was speechless. Again. He couldn't bring himself to say anything in front of her.

"Suicune! Finally! Now we can be together forever!"

Scratch that. Eusine couldn't have said anything in front of her that was more disturbing. Eusine took out a Pokéball from his belt and Suicune quickly realized it was a Master Ball.

Yeah, it was time to RUN.

With the speed of a cheetah, she leapt out of the water, dashed under Eusine's legs and ran for the cave exit.

"Suicune! Come back!" the stalker yelled as he tried to run after the Aurora Pokémon. "I won't hurt you!"

Not surprisingly, it was hard for the caped man to keep up with Suicune. Though, he had prepared for something like this. Eusine threw off his cape and accelerated faster. He had practiced running, apparently.

Suicune looked behind her as she ran down a small down-hill grassy path. She had expected that she had lost her stalker. To her surprise, she could still see Eusine. Not close enough to send a Pokémon after her, but close enough to toss the Master Ball.

With all of his might, Eusine threw the Master Ball towards her. He prayed that it would get her. Since he tossed the ball down-hill, Suicune was smart enough to realize that if she stopped, the Ball would sail over her.

Her hypothesis turned out to be right. The ball indeed sailed over her head and continued to go down. She smirked. She was very proud of herself; being able to outwit Eusine and avoid his Master Ball, which he probably had to pay a fortune for.

Unfortunately, there was one small kink in her plan.

_"Wait… if it didn't get me, then who will it hit at the bottom of this hill?"_

She gasped as she resumed running down-hill in an area the Master Ball couldn't hit her.

_"Please don't be Entei. Please don't be Entei. Please don't be Entei." _she hoped. Entei was still out looking for Raikou, and Suicune had no idea where Entei was. He could be miles away… or at the bottom of the hill.

Oh, how cruel fate can be.

The wolf managed to reach the bottom fast enough. To her utter horror, Entei was at the bottom, still walking around slowly, looking for the thunder tiger. And the ball was heading STRAIGHT FOR HIM.

"Entei!" the canine hollered.

Entei turned around and saw Suicune, blissfully unaware of the projectile heading for him.

"Oh, hey Suicune! Glad to see you're feeling…"

"Get out of the way!"

"Of what?"

Just as Entei uttered his last word, the ball tapped him on the head. He turned around to see a Master Ball open, zapping a ray of red energy at him.

"Wha-?"

The energy enveloped him and turned his form from matter into energy. The ball closed, shook three times as the beast of Fire tried to break out (but to no avail), and then the ball finally *clicked*, indicating a successful capture.

Suicune was going to go and grab the ball, but had no time since Eusine was coming down quickly to retrieve his Master Ball, forcing her to hide instead.

Eusine finally reached the bottom and noticed his Master Ball on the ground. He picked it up slowly. It didn't break, so it had to have caught…

"Yes!" he shouted for joy to the heavens. "Yes! I did it! I finally have caught the legendary beast of water, SUICUNE!"

The actual Suicune was hiding behind a tree, out of Eusine's field of vision.

"Oh man. Now what do I do?" she asked herself, as the white-caped man was skipping happily all the way back to Johto.

This was not her day.

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © NintendoGame Freak_

Looks like Ty and Raikou are teaming together for their first assignment. Entei and Suicune continue their search for Raikou, but they get caught up with the Suicune-obsessed Eusine...


	5. Emotionless

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 5: Emotionless

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><p>So far, today has been pretty interesting. I wake up in a chamber filled with Garchomps and other fierce Pokémon Team Rocket loves to use, and meet a cyborg Typhlosion (which is actually kind of awesome) who had, but can hardly remember anything about, a trainer he once had. Now, he and I are supposed to steal the Enigma Stone, a stone that's only rumored to be linked to the Eon Pokémon; Latios and Latias. What the hell is Team Rocket going to do with it, anyway? Smash it open and hope they come out? They can flush it down a toilet for all I care.<p>

No matter what Team Rocket decided do with it, Typhlosion and I still had to retrieve it for them and right now, we were making our way through Pewter City; carefully as to not let anyone see us. We were currently hiding behind an alleyway, within easy running distance of the museum. Typhlosion slowly peeked his head out looking carefully, probably to see if anybody was coming this way. On the road visible across from us, cars were zooming by at breakneck speed apparently not caring if they ran over somebody, as long as they got to their destination in time…

_"Whatever happened to obeying the speed limit?" _I wondered.

One car went by, a red pickup truck (a very nice shiny new one) at nearly the speed of a racecar. The young white-skinned teenager driving had only one hand on the wheel with the other one formed as a fist pumped in the air.

He was shouting. Shouting that he was finally 'free' and away from his parents, whom he referred to as 'my old man and his bitch'. The teenager was swerving around like a drunk driver.

I moved from my position to get a better look, slowly shifting my feet around. One of my paws slipped on… a liquid, but I'm not sure what it was… and I ended up doing a faceplant into the concrete. On the concrete, my face fell into… something rather disgusting. I'm not sure what it was and I don't think I want to know.

"Teenagers…" muttered Typhlosion. "Sooner or later, that idiot's going to…"

CRASH!

"Knew it." the bear… badger… wolverine… thing correctly predicted.

"What happened?" I asked. I swiftly poked my head out of the alleyway to get a better view of what was the 'accident'. Ty pulled my head back in just as quickly.

"What was that f-?" Ty used his claw to cover my mouth, but left my nose uncovered as to not suffocate me.

"Calm down. Calm down. You can't make any noise. You're a Legendary. If people see you, they're going to try and catch you."

After I stopped make noise under Typhlosion's cold claw, he removed it from my mouth and I tried to catch my breath.

"And you never know if someone has a Master Ball…" Ty took out a small device stored in his pack. It was a small dark blue circular device. It was maybe an inch thick and flat on both sides. On one side was a red button. The wolverine (A/N: I think I'll stick with that) handed it off to me.

"So… what is it?" I questioned him. "Some sort of hockey puck?"

"A cloaking device. Team Rocket designed these and I've been using them on my missions. You can use them to make yourself invisible to the naked eye. But you still 'exist' so people can still hear or feel you. On the downside, these things have a really, really bad battery life. That's why I held off on using them."

I awed as I inspected the small device. "How do they work?"

"Hand it to me and I'll show you." I did as he requested and handed it back to him. Once I did, he lifted my front left paw and set the device on the back of it. He depressed the button and immediately, it began to vibrate and four small metal arms with little 'hooks' emerged from it. I looked at Typhlosion nervously. He only flashed that genuine smile again. But this time, it didn't make me feel any less nervous.

The device's arms pushed themselves downwards and the hooks grasped onto the tender skin of my paw. I expected a sharp sting from them, but it turned out to be more of a gentle prod, really.

"…It's done, right?" I asked the cyborg.

"Take a look at yourself."

"Look at myself? I don't see any…" I stopped myself mid-sentence. I couldn't see any part of my body at all. But I still saw, heard, felt, and… I certainly smelled whatever my face landed in earlier…

"I admit this is seriously cool. Next, you're going to tell me you can fly."

Typhlosion rolled his eyes. "Don't be silly. I can't even learn the HM."

"Even with you being a cyborg?"

"I'm a cybernetic being, not the miracle Mew who can learn every move."

And with that, he took another cloaking device out of his backpack and did the same procedure he did with me, except… I saw him flash, but he didn't turn invisible.

"Wait a second. Aren't you supposed to be invisible?"

"Oh, I am. You can just see me since you have a cloaking device on as well. I can see you too." he explained.

I shrugged my shoulders. "Whatever you say…"

And with that taken care of, we promptly left the alley.

_"But this thing is kind of tight, though." _I noted to myself as I pulled and prodded at the device clamped to my skin.

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><p>We walked down the sidewalk and we passed by where we had heard the pickup crash. Turns out, the driver had been drunk (easy to figure out from the large number of shattered beer bottles near his car) and the truck had rammed into a Poké Mart. Into the glass windows surrounding the store no less. Judging from the large number of small shards on the ground, I would say huge chunks of glass had flown high through the air and smashed down to the pavement further shattering them. The truck was stuck halfway through the window. A number of police cars and ambulances zoomed to the store and I couldn't help but wonder if everyone was OK.<p>

"They can take of it." Typhlosion assured me. "Right now, we need to get the Enigma Stone. These things' batteries only have 20 minutes left." He walked off towards the Pewter City Museum and I looked back at the gruesome scene one last time before proceeding to follow him.

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><p>The Pewter City Museum of Science was only a short 5 minute walk from where we had first put on the cloaking devices, but according to Typhlosion, that only gave a total of 15 minutes to grab the stone. In the center of the museum was a large blue sphere and enveloping it were small clear crystals.<p>

"That's the Enigma Stone." Typhlosion pointed out. "Here's the plan to get it."

"I'm listening."

"That stone is precious to the Pewter Museum, so it's guarded well. It's surrounded by a bullet-proof glass case. The only way to remove it is to undo the case's lock."

"How do we accomplish that in a span of 15 minutes, exactly?" I asked him.

"I'm going to sneak into the back to the security room. When I get there, you're going to pull the fire alarm to get everyone out of the building. I'll deactivate the lock on the case and…"

Typhlosion rummaged through his pack to pull out a perfect replica of the Enigma Stone, possibly given to him by Team Rocket.

"…Then you're going to switch the fake Enigma Stone for the real one. Put the case back on, I'll relock it and it'll be nothing ever happened."

"Ty…" I muttered.

"Yeah?"

"I don't really want to do this. It… doesn't feel right, even if our lives depend on it." I confessed to him.

Typhlosion nodded his head. "Believe me, I don't want to do this anymore then you do, Raikou. But in all honesty, if I hadn't followed Team Rocket's orders for so long, I can guarantee you I wouldn't be here."

"All right… I guess we have to do what we have to do." I sighed.

"Okay, I'm off to the back. See me over there so you know when to pull the alarm."

Raikou followed Typhlosion off to the back of the museum. It wasn't hard for them to get past the security guards and through the back door since they were FREAKIN' INVISIBLE. The hard part came when they reached the door to the security room which required a password to be entered in order to continue.

"Now what? I think we're stuck here and a Flamethrower's definitely not going to burn down that thick door."

"This isn't too much of a problem." Typhlosion grinned.

Typhlosion moved his hand over to the half of his head that was metallic and pushed a button. A set of goggles emerged from the top of his pack onto his eyes. He began turning a small dial on the side of the goggles. As he did the color of the lenses changed from green to red, blue, and then he stopped turning on the color purple.

"Let's see… the keys that have been hit according to the fingerprints are… W, S, E, T, Y, N, O …and L."

"Oh boy." I muttered.

"Now what words can you make with those letters?" Typhlosion wondered.

He began to type in words with an astounding WPM.

Not.

**Access Denied; **The computer flashed.

Slow.

**Access Denied**

Tyson.

**Access Denied.**

Yes No.

**Access Denied.**

The minutes ticked by as Typhlosion sped through many options trying to figure out the password for the room. Try after try, his entries were unsuccessful.

West.

Stone.

_"Stone?" _I thought. _"Wouldn't a museum dedicated to geology have a password that had to do with rocks? Hmm…"_

"Hey." I whispered to him. He stopped typing for a second and looked at me, his head slightly cocked.

"Yeah?"

"Wouldn't a museum completely dedicated to geology have a password that had something to do with rocks?"

A/N: Repetitiveness is repetitive.

"I suppose that would sense." he realized. "But wouldn't that be too predictable?"

I looked at him with a serious expression on my face and set my front paws on his shoulders and told him, "Typhlosion, this is the world of Pokémon. Where ten year old kids can legally own a ferocious monster that could hypothetically kill them. Where you can attempt to catch Pokémon with the power of a GOD. Where an annoying narrator always explains the adventures of an apparently never aging boy even though it's not that hard to figure out and kids aren't idiots these days. Where logic doesn't even apply. It's supposed to be that predictable. Trust me on this."

"Umm… Ok, then. You have any idea on a rock-related password besides 'stone'? I'm thinking we might want to hurry; these cloaking devices have only 5 minutes' worth of battery life left."

"Hmm… Types of rocks like obsidian, or sandstone are out." I told Ty. "The letters for those haven't been used."

"Sandstone…" he muttered. "Hmm… E… L… Y… W… O…, Yellow… that's it!"

He quickly typed in the word 'Yellowstone', the name of a large national park in the United States. The door then promptly opened and allowed Typhlosion to get through.

"Head back to the main room and pull the fire alarm. I'll release the lock here. And hurry, we only have 3 minutes left!" He handed the fake Enigma Stone to me.

I nodded and dashed back to the main room to a fire alarm switch and pulled it. Immediately, the alarm buzzed ever so loudly and annoyingly. A good portion of the people began to panic and scream (didn't they ever take fire drills in school…). On the other hand, some people DID remember what to do when the alarm rang: walk quickly to the nearest exit.

Several of the museum attendants and director were helping the people going nuts calm down and get out of the building (it's not like there was actually a fire…). I took this chance to run over to where the Enigma Stone was kept; the locks were already undone by Typhlosion.

I took the real Enigma Stone and swiftly swapped it for the fake one. I then set the glass case back on the stand, which immediately re-locked. Typhlosion was probably watching the whole thing from the museum's security camera.

I felt guilty. I mean really, really guilty. The kind of guilty that your conscience tries to completely devour you alive with. I still wanted to make things right and give the real stone back, but Team Rocket isn't stupid. They gave us the fake stone; they'd obviously know if we gave them the fake one back.

_"Just… just suck it up, Raikou." _I whispered in my head.

I left the main hall and dashed down the hall leading to the security room. Typhlosion was already outside of the room and ahead of me, both of us dashing to the emergency exit. He got outside first, and I followed shortly. The cloaking devices had finally run out of batteries. We both dashed up to the more rugged mountain terrain just behind the Pewter City Museum.

He was a good distance ahead of me when my feet slowly began to decelerate to a stop.

"What's wrong?" he turned around and walked back to me. "Everything went well. We got the Enigma Stone, nobody even got hurt, and they'll think the fake one in the case is the real one."

My head was hanging low, as guiltily as a disobedient dog's. "That's just it, Ty. They might not know it, but I will. It's wrong. What I would rather do right now, instead of giving this stone to Team Rocket is give it back to the museum."

"Raikou…"

I lifted my head up to face him. "Typhlosion, Ho-Oh sent our trio to guard Johto and help people in need. This is the complete opposite of what she wanted me… wanted my trio to do!" My voice began to rise in pitch considerably, startling him. "If Ho-Oh knew what we were doing, she would be ashamed of me! It's just…! Just…! Ugh… It's not right." I sighed. I didn't feel much better. So much anger and frustration was still trapped inside of me.

Typhlosion sighed now. "Raikou… I kind of understand what're going through right now."

I could hold my chained feelings no longer and I erupted. "No, you don't! I've been raised by Ho-Oh to be good and righteous and help others my entire life! And now… And now, I'm just supposed to throw all of what she's taught me away! She's my mother, Typhlosion! She revived me from the Burned Tower half a century ago! I owe this to her!" I screamed to him. I had lost all of my sensibility and self-control.

The cyborg was starting to tear up. He tried to calm me down, but to no avail.

"Raikou…"

"Shut up! Don't say you know what I'm going through, because you sure as hell don't! You worked for them your entire life! You have worked for them since you were a young Cyndaquil! You're a machine! You don't feel any remorse! You don't feel any guilt! You don't feel ANYTHING!"

My ferocious tirade was finally over and my throat was so immensely sore that I finally stopped. As I could finally recover myself from the depths of my rage, my head looked to Typhlosion.

He was crying. Small tears descended from his eyes. Guilt coursed through my veins again, this time to such intensity that my guilt was ready to drag me into the black abyss.

"You don't think I feel anything?" he wept. "You don't think I feel guilty taking and stealing and killing people every day all for the good of Team Rocket? You think that because part of me is machine that I am emotionless? Then tell me Raikou, why am I crying?"

I didn't know what to say. I didn't know what I could say to undo the damage. My temper had gotten me in trouble before, but I never felt so… horrible in my life. Even the time I broke my two front legs felt better than this. There was only one thing I could say.

"I'm sorry."

"…It's time to get back to HQ. They're waiting for us."

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><p><em>Pokémon © NintendoGame Freak_

This was a fun and dramatic chapter for me to write. Notice how Entei and Suicune weren't in this chapter at all? Don't worry, they'll be hogging up the next one.


	6. Captive

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 6: Captive

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><p>You ever have one of those days that just sucked?<p>

I mean really, really sucked?

Like the level of suck when one day, everything that could possibly go wrong did?

Entei was having one of those days. Here he was, stuck in a Master Ball and his virtual simulation (a hot sunny beach next to the cool ocean water) with no way out until Eusine lets him. Entei stood on the beach, with one foot in the water. It felt so nice and cool, and so soothing that he could just walk right in. The ocean water relaxed his tense, anxious muscles, though some of the tension came back as he could feel Eusine running at top speed to get home as quickly as possible to release 'Suicune'.

"Well, Eusine's going to be in for a bit of a disappointment." the Fire Beast muttered to himself. "Hope he's at least a fan of Entei."

_"Entei? Not Suicune?" _came a psychic voice from somewhere.

_"Who's there?" _Entei answered back telepathically. He lifted his feet off of the sandy floor and began to float in the water.

_"I'm Eusine's Alakazam." _he introduced himself._ "I'm in the Pokéball next to yours. Kind of surprised to see… well, hear you actually. I was expecting someone else."_

_ "You mean my counterpart, Suicune?" _

_ "Bingo. My master is very interested in… him or her?" _Alakazam questioned, not knowing which gender Suicune preferred.

_ "Her. And interested is a bit of an understatement, if you know what I mean."_

_ "Can't say I disagree with you, Entei." _the psychic sighed._ "Eusine's fascination with her borderlines on Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and not to mention I'm pretty sure he's stalking her."_

_ "Borderlines? I'd say it outright smashes her privacy with a hammer. She's beginning to wish she had stayed with Ethan, and I don't blame her."_

_ "Point taken. Either way, Eusine's gonna be pretty freaked when he sees you."_

Jingling outside of both of the Pokéballs could be heard and the sound of a door opening could be heard.

_"We're here, aren't we?" _Entei sighed.

_"Yeah. But, you know, life here really isn't so bad. Eusine is a little… weird at times, but he's really nice."_

_ "I believe you, Alakazam. But this is just not a good time for me to get caught."_

_ "What do you mean?"_

Before Entei had the chance to answer Alakazam, he felt his ball being thrown up and about to open.

"Come on out, Suicune!" Entei heard Eusine's voice.

_"Prepare to be disappointed."_

* * *

><p>Entei came out of the Master Ball and rematerialized in Eusine's house. He sat quietly on the carpet in the living room, looking at a dumb-founded Eusine. Along with Entei, Alakazam had also been released.<p>

"B-B-Bbbb-b…" he stuttered. "B-But how? I know I got Suicune! This doesn't make any sense!"

"How about I put things simply for you?" Entei told the Mystery Man. "The ball hit me and not Suicune, end of story. Shall I take my leave now?"

"But-But… that was my only Master Ball! Do you know how hard it is to get those things?" Eusine exasperated.

"Yes, exceedingly. Had it not been a Master Ball, I wouldn't be here."

Entei sat still as he peered around the living room. It was pretty standard as Entei faced a clock on the back wall with the fireplace underneath it. To the right wall were a small couch and a corridor leading to a hallway. The left wall had various pictures, some of him, some of his friends… and surprise, surprise, some pictures of Suicune. A table next to the wall had a digital clock and a small lamp for he suspected was reading, seeing as a comfortable chair was next to said table. Behind Entei was the kitchen.

"Decent room. This would seem like a nice place to stay."

"You're staying?" Eusine asked, though his tone seemed to hint it was more of a command than a request.

"Just temporarily. It's getting late and in the morning, I have to get going to-"

"But you can't leave." Eusine said darkly. Alakazam glanced at the purple clothed man, surprised at his change of personality.

Entei snarled angrily at the man. "Who are you to tell me that I can't leave?"

"But I own you." He flaunted his cape as he decided to elaborate Pokémon capture laws to me.

"OWN ME?"

"Johto laws state that when a wild Pokémon has been caught by a trainer, if said Pokémon is not under the current ownership of another trainer, then said Pokémon is under legal ownership of the trainer until said trainer decides to release said Pokémon or if said Pokémon is under abuse."

The speech left Entei anxious and he gulped nervously. His day dove from 'minorly annoying' to 'hell with Eusine'.

"Ala…" Alakazam gasped. Eusine was a nut for Suicune, he knew that. But this was not what he had expected his master to do.

Eusine smiled. "Believe me, Entei. I have no intention of harming you. But if I can't have Suicune, then you'll have to stay here and be the substitute."

Entei stood there open-jawed, trying to fully comprehend what the crazy caped man had said.

"Now then, would you like something to eat?"

"…"

"Pizza it is, then. I'll go order." Eusine walked off to the kitchen behind Entei and grabbed the house phone. "Hello, Papa John's? I'd like to order…"

"…" Entei stood where he was at, motionless. He made no sound.

Alakazam walked up to the Volcano Pokémon and set his hand on his shoulder. The two began to walk through the hallway and into a quiet, secluded room.

"Entei…" sighed the psychic Pokémon. "I… this wasn't supposed to happen. He's not normally like this."

"…"

"He's not a bad guy, honestly. I've known him my whole life. He just gets… crazy when it comes to Suicune. Eusine's just frustrated."

"…Can you help me escape?" Entei asked with pleading eyes.

Alakazam sighed. "Entei… I can't."

"Please, Alakazam?" he begged. "I got caught up here because I was looking for my electric counterpart, Raikou. He must've gotten lost or captured or something and I'm searching everywhere for him."

Alakazam looked surprised. "Raikou? You mean, the Legendary Beast of Thunder, Raikou? He's missing?"

Entei nodded solemnly. "He's been missing for a long while and, to be truthful, I'm really worried about him." the Fire Beast began to shake nervously. Entei was normally a stable Pokémon but if he didn't know about if someone close to him was safe or cared for, he could become a nervous wreck. "I don't know where he is or what he's doing or even if he's OK. That's why you've got to help me escape. Please, Alakazam?"

The psychic Pokémon sighed. "I'm not sure if I can help you escape…"

Entei sighed, depressed and unsure of what Alakazam's option would be.

"But… maybe I can talk to Eusine about this. If I told him your predicament, I'm sure he'd understand."

"Really?"

"Pizza's here!" shouted Eusine's voice through the house and to Entei's and Alakazam's secluded room.

"I promise I'll talk to him about it over dinner tonight. I'm sure he'll let you go once he understands the situation you're in." assured Alakazam.

"Let's hope…"

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><p>Entei and Alakazam walked to the kitchen as Eusine finished paying the pizza man and shut the door.<p>

"Table or TV tonight, guys?" Eusine asked the two Pokémon.

"Table." said Alakazam. "There is… something I wish to discuss with you, master. Something important."

"Well, all right then." Eusine slid the box off of his hand and onto the table, which promptly opened to reveal warm, delicious cheese pizza. He glided over to the kitchen cabinets and tossed out paper plates, which Alakazam grabbed telekinetically. The psychic then quickly whipped the plates onto opposite ends to the table and one in the middle. He just as swiftly set the paper plates back in the cabinet.

"Ready to feast?"

Alakazam took a piece of pizza from the pie and set it on his plate. Eusine and reluctantly, Entei did as well.

Entei chomped into the chewy cheese with his feline/canine molars. It did taste pretty good, nice and chewy. The pizza makers' didn't skimp out on the sauce and cheese either, unlike a lot of companies. The tastes blended together to create the perfectly delicious pizza. Not to mention, he had also ordered the one with the cheese in the middle of the crust. Ohhh…

Entei almost forgot about the matter at hand until Alakazam brought it up.

"Master, as I said; I wish to discuss something rather important to you."

"Well? Shoot!" Eusine kicked back casually in the chair.

"Umm… Well, it's about Entei."

"What about Entei?" the Mystery Man inquired. "You're going to enjoy training with him, Alakazam. He'll prove to be quite the challenge for you!"

"Yes, well…" the psychic Pokémon began to stall. What were the right words? How could Alakazam phrase it so it wouldn't infuriate Eusine?

"…Yeah?" wondered Eusine.

"He's in a predicament."

"If getting captured counts…"

Alakazam cut Eusine off. "It's not that! His counterpart has been kidnapped."

_"I don't think I explicitly said 'kidnapped'." _Entei debated mentally.

Eusine gasped and stood up dramatically from the table. "Someone got their mitts on Suicune before I did?"

"No, not Suicune! The other one."

"Oh… Raikou."

"Yes. And if he's locked up in here, he won't be able to look for him. Entei's really concerned about him, so I think it would be considerate of you to…"

"No." Eusine stated blankly.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN, NO?" screamed Entei at the top of his lungs. The roar knocked Eusine out of his chair and onto the ground. He quickly stood back up and set the chair up next to the table.

"What do you think 'no' means?" the caped man inquired.

"But why would you even want to keep me?" Entei said after he turned his voice down several decibels. "It's not even me you're interested in, it's Suicune."

"That's exactly why I'm keeping you." he smirked.

"Wh- But- You…" the realization hit Entei like a freight train. "You're keeping me as ransom?"

Alakazam looked unsteady. "M-Master. Are you sure about this? I know you want to meet Suicune, but is keeping Entei for ransom really the best answer?"

"Believe me, Alakazam. If I have one of Suicune's counterparts, I won't have to chase after her. She'll come running right to me."

Entei sighed. "How can you be so heartless…?"

* * *

><p><em>Somewhere else in Kanto…<em>

Entei wasn't the only one having a bad day…

"This is great, just great. How in the bloody hell am I supposed to find Eusine in the entire region of Kanto? No, it's not enough Raikou went missing; now I get to search for my Fire counterpart, too! Whoop-de-doo!" Her sarcasm was bursting at the seams…

It was raining harshly and the wind was cold that night as Suicune roamed Kanto to try and find Entei, whom Eusine accidently kidnapped. She was having zero luck so far and even after searching the entire Viridian City, she still couldn't figure out where Eusine lived. She was, at the moment, sitting in a back street, contemplating her next move.

"All of this blindly searching is pointless." she muttered. "If I'm going to find Entei, I need something or someone that can point me to where Eusine lives. But how am I going to do that? I don't stand a chance by myself."

She sighed. She felt so helpless, that she couldn't do anything to save both of her counterparts. She wished she could, because she certainly had the courage to go out into densely populated cities and look for them, dangerously putting herself at the risk of being caught. But despite risking so much, it hadn't helped her in finding Entei or Raikou one bit.

"For now, I don't think I can do much of anything."

"…And so, after all of that practicing and training, my Feraligatr and I finally beat the Battle Frontier! Let me tell you Lyra, the people there are complete cheaters! They… "

Suicune's sharp ears picked up on the conversation, faint and occurring in the distance.

"That voice… it sounds familiar. Deeper and gruffer to be sure, but definitely familiar… could it really be…?"

"Ethan? Lyra?" she walked cautiously out of the back street and into the open. She looked to her right and her eyes caught a man under an umbrella, maybe 16 to 18 years old walking a woman around the same age and a Feraligatr. They were walking down the sidewalk and on the street.

The woman had on a white cap with a red stripe across the front. Instead of pigtails, her brown hair now hung down straight. The woman's red shirt, which used to come to her elbows, was cut back to short sleeves. Her Mario-esque overalls were ditched in favor of long blue jeans and her stockings were now simply socks.

The man, however, still had the same hat he had on as a kid. He wasn't wearing his knickerbockers at the moment, but he was wearing long jeans like Lyra, suitable for the cold weather. He no longer fit into his smaller red jacket, and was wearing instead a blue long-sleeved one with the Legendary Beasts' insignias on it.

"And so…" Ethan glanced over at Lyra, who wasn't paying attention and was looking ahead the street at Suicune, though the woman could only make out a vague silhouette.

"Ethan?"

"Yeah?"

"I think I see something up ahead, but this rain is so heavy; I can't make out what it is."

Ethan's interest perked up. "What kind of thing?"

"Hmm…" Lyra considered. "Maybe a Pokémon?"

Ethan grinned. "Let's hope it's a good one!" The eager young adult ran down the street with Pokéball in hand, as if he was 10 again.

"Ethan!" Lyra yelled after him. "Wait up; you know I'm slower than you!"

Suicune opened her mouth in awe as she could confirm heading for her with Ethan. With his help, she would be able to figure out where Raikou and Entei were!

Ethan ran rather quickly, accidently over-shooting the back street the blue wolf was in. He attempted to turn right back around, but with the rain he slid up into the air and fell flat on his back comically, much like you see in the cartoons.

"Ow… Back… hurting… tremendously." he squealed.

Suicune couldn't help but to burst out in laughter.

"Ahahahahahaha! Oh my gosh, that was hilarious! You always did that as a kid, too! Ha!"

"That voice… it can't be… Suicune?"

Suicune walked up to Ethan and set her body over him. "Who else would desire to laugh at your pain?"

Ethan sighed. "Of course, you would. But I never expected to see you again… umm… could you help me up, please?"

Suicune got a few more laughs in before she agreed. "All right. All right. Here, give me your hand."

The Pokémon Trainer did as the Legendary Beast of Water requested. After give Suicune his right hand, she helped pull Ethan back up to his feet. She had little trouble with it since she has excellent strength and her firm non-slipping stand on the ground.

A second figure came from the depths of the rain and slowly managed to work its' way up to the duo.

"Ethan! Honestly, why do you have to run so fast? You know you could've…" Lyra stopped ranting to Ethan the second she set her eyes on Suicune. "I-It can't be… It's b-been so long…"

Suicune chuckled. "Nice to see you again too, Lyra."

"What are you doing here?" asked Ethan and Lyra in sync.

"I'd love to explain, but can we talk about it inside? It's raining Purrloins and Lillipups out here!"

"Point taken. In that case, why don't we get a room at the local Pokémon Center for the night?"

"…So, what you're saying is that both of your counterparts are missing and you want us to help you find them?"

The two trainers and Suicune were sitting down in a room in the Pokémon Center that Ethan had paid for (He's the Johto Champion, after all). Ethan and Lyra were lounging in separate beds while Suicune was on the floor between them, elaborating her story.

"Yes. I know Entei was accidently captured by Eusine when he was trying to catch me instead. I'll bet Eusine has him, I just don't know where he lives."

"That's easy." Ethan said. "Eusine's house is in Celadon City. In the morning, I can take you there and we can work something out with him."

"You would?"

"Sure, it's no problem. My mother raised me to help others in need and I think you definitely qualify. What about Raikou, though?"

"No clue." the Beast sighed. "All both Entei and I know is that he went missing after he stormed out of the cave because he and Entei got in a fight. We waited for Raikou to come back after he had cooled down, but he never did."

"Then our best bet is to go after Entei since we know where he is. Chasing Raikou right now would be a fruitless effort."

"I guess you're right, Ethan. You were always pretty smart for a kid and you haven't lost that yet."

"It's getting late though. We need to get to sleep." Ethan looked to a digital clock on his bed that read 10:00 p.m. "We won't have any luck finding them if we're dead tired."

"And now I guess I've taken your point. I don't have a Pokéball anymore, so I'll sleep here on the carpet."

Ethan grinned. "Good night, 'Cune."

Suicune smiled at hearing the nickname Ethan had given her so long ago.

"Good night, Ethan." The wolf cuddled up to a comfortable position on the floor and rested her head.

_ "Raikou... Entei... I'll find you guys. Don't worry."_

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © NintendoGame Freak_

More of a filler chapter than anything, elaborating on Entei's and Suicune's side of the story. Next chapter will feature Raikou again.


	7. Inorganic

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 7: Inorganic

WARNING: SPOILERS IN THIS CHAPTER FOR POKEMON: BLACK AND WHITE! Though, I'm sure most of you guys have already played the new games…

"_The cyborg would not recognize the Garden of Eden; it is not made of mud and cannot dream of returning to dust."_

— **Donna Haraway**

* * *

><p>"Typhlosion…"<p>

"I don't want to talk."

Typhlosion and I had come back to Team Rocket HQ as required of us. When we finished our assignment, we got in a bit of a… quarrel. I was… very aggravated over the fact that I was stuck here until someone came to save me. I didn't want to do any of this stuff… but… my temper took me way too far this time. I said words that I now regret ever came out of my mouth. We were back in the break room that we first met in. I've been trying to apologize to him, but… what are the right words?

I'm sorry?

No, I'm gonna need to say more than that. One sorry just doesn't cut it with Ty…

"Maybe… maybe calling you a 'machine' was a bit much…" I sighed.

"Well… no actually. That's quite accurate." he confessed, sighing to himself. "Machine would be an accurate term."

I tried to protest. "Well…" and that's when I stopped myself. I wasn't going to win this argument… because Typhlosion was right.

"You can say it, Raikou. You already did. What you said at the museum hurt me… but in all honesty… it was a 100% true. On the way back, I really took your words into consideration. Team Rocket revived me from near-death because they saw use in me… but sometimes, I wish they never did. A machine is what I am now and I can't change that, no matter how I want to."

He continued to explain his thoughts to me.

"I guess… it's not all bad. After all, there are plenty of advantages; if there wasn't then I would be dead now."

He then lifted his eyes to look at me coldly. The difference was easily seen inside them. One was natural, was perfect, organic… and real. The other was not something a Typhlosion was ever supposed to or meant to have. It was unnatural, cold, fake… inorganic. His metallic red iris looked shamefully at me. Fear and regret pierced my heart simultaneously.

"But one thing I am most certainly not. I might be 'Mon, I might be machine, I might be a freak, but the one thing I am most definitely not is EMOTIONLESS!"

It was now Ty's turn to be a raging sea of emotions. I could not feel what coursed through him, but I knew what was.

Fear.

Anger.

Hurt.

Sadness.

And…

Regret.

"Umm… Ty?" I whispered.

"Get out. GET OUT! GET OUT OF HERE NOW!"

Typhlosion roared loudly and how. His terrifying screams were fearful, angry, pained, saddened and regretful. It was even enough to send me, Raikou, stumbling back in fear of him. He began to throw objects around the room like a mad man. Various glasses, the coffee table, and even the couch we first sat on all went flying.

I immediately high-tailed it out of there as fast as my legs could carry me.

I dashed out and turned a corner quickly, not taking notice of what was ahead of me.

BONK!

"Ow. Ow." I muttered as I rubbed my head. "That makes the second time today I've bonked my head…"

"Are you OK?"

I took my paws off and saw an Infernape sitting on the ground, also looking at me. His head was purple from the bruise I probably gave him.

"Yeah, I'm fine." I told him while I stood back up. "But your head probably looks worse than mine."

"I doubt it." he said as he regained his balance. "Yours doesn't look that bad. But don't sweat it, I'll get over mine."

Both of our eyes widened as we heard a ferocious roar still coming from the break room.

"Uhh… what was that?" he asked me.

"You really want to know?"

"Rhetorical question." the flaming monkey told me. "That's Cyber-Ty, isn't it? I'd recognize that roar anywhere."

"Yeah…" I sighed.

Suddenly, as soon as Ty's roaring rampage started, it stopped. His terrifying howls had ceased.

"Do you… think we should go check on him?" I asked, unsure if it would be safe or not.

"We should. He should be calmed down by now."

The Infernape and I walked back to the break room and opened the door. The room had been hit by a violent tornado. The coffee table was upside down in the middle of the room, the magazines on the table were now strewn across the floor, and the coffee machine had shattered and glass pieces as well as made coffee were spread around the floor. Inside was Cyber-Ty, with his head hanging low and his paws over his face.

Now he was ashamed of himself.

"Typhlosion?" I asked him gently. "Are you OK?"

"What does it look like?" he sighed, facing downward hiding his face from my view. "I'm an idiot."

"Hey Ty," began the Infernape. "We all lose it at one point or another. How about I help you clean this mess up?"

"It's not your responsibility Victor; it's mine. I lost it; I rampaged. I'll have to tell Team Rocket that I did this and then…" Typhlosion shuddered.

"Ty, I'm not going to risk my best friend since I first got here getting shut down. Ty… I don't want them to do that to you. We'll just clean it up, so it's like nothing ever…"

All hopes of just cleaning up the mess and getting away with it instantly vaporized when Archer himself walked into the break room. His face was filled with shock and horror; he certainly hadn't expected this…

"WHAT THE HELL JUST HAPPENED HERE?"

Typhlosion stepped up to Archer to confess.

"I…"

Victor cut in almost immediately. "I kind of lost my cool in here. Typhlosion and I got into a fight over something stupid and well, I sorta spazzed out. He tried to calm me down, but I went a little too far. Forgive me, Archer. I'll clean up if you want me to."

My jaw dropped. That was a tremendous sacrifice Victor was making for Typhlosion, especially considering how harsh Team Rocket's punishments were. I didn't know this Infernape personally, but he had already earned himself several points in my book for such a selfless act.

"…Infernape." sighed Archer. "What are we going to do with you? Come along with me, and Giovanni will decide a proper punishment for you."

Victor simply nodded his head.

I looked over at Typhlosion, whose guilt was destroying his heart. He didn't want his best friend to take the fall for him. I could even feel his guilt stack up taller and taller and taller and taller until…

"It wasn't Infernape; I did it."

Both Victor and Archer looked back, startled by Typhlosion's shout. Ty looked over to his friend.

"Victor, you're a great pal. Really and truly. But I can't let you take the fall for me; it's not right."

"But Ty, I don't want you-"

"So Typhlosion, you're the one who caused this mess."

Ty slowly hanged his head down then slowly raised it back up.

"Yes."

"…Come along, Typhlosion. Giovanni will decide what to do with you."

Typhlosion gulped nervously. "Yes, sir."

The two then left the break room, leaving me and Victor by ourselves.

"Victor… do you… do you think he'll be OK?"

"We can only hope, Raikou, We can only hope…"

* * *

><p>"Yes, Archer. What is so important for you to interrupt my work?"<p>

Giovanni was at his desk, sitting in his chair and working on paperwork. I had quietly followed Archer to Giovanni's office and was peeking at what was going on through an open crack in the door.

"Typhlosion made a bit of a… mess in the break room."

Giovanni shrugged his shoulders. "So, if it's just a minor mess, then…"

"It's far from 'minor', sir."

Giovanni glared suspiciously at Ty then looked back up to Archer. "What do you mean by 'far from minor'?"

"Well… the entire room is trashed, sir. The table and couch are flipped over, coffee is spilled everywhere, and glass is all over the floor."

Giovanni looked to Archer. "You're dismissed. I'll talk to Typhlosion about this."

"Of course." And with that he left. Fortunately, I was hiding in the shadows of the hall, so he hadn't seen me. I looked back through the door which he had left cracked open again.

Giovanni looked to the cyborg. "And you did that?"

Typhlosion could only nod his head slowly.

The Rocket Boss closed his eyes as he rubbed his temples and sighed. "Typhlosion, that's the second time you've done something like this." He then turned his gaze back onto the Cyborg Pokémon. At Giovanni's deathly gaze, Typhlosion faltered.

"In all honesty, Typhlosion, I don't want you to turn out like Cyborg Model #001…"

Typhlosion's eyes went wide with fear upon hearing that; he clasped his hands together and pled with the Rocket Boss; "Sir, please! I-I don't want to turn out like Charizard did! I won't; I promise!" Ty's voice then lowered to a whisper; "Please. I don't want to be shut down. Don't shut me down. Please."

Giovanni went deeper into thought then asked of Typhlosion; "Are you… angry about this whole scenario? That there's no way to reverse it without killing you?"

Ty then confessed to Giovanni about what he had apparently lied about to me earlier today. Now, he was revealing his true feelings…

"Well… to be truly honest… I'm a little frustrated, sir. I am… knowledgeable of that fact that it cannot be reversed. Though, I'm not… completely furious, sir."

"Then why on earth would you totally demolish the break room?"

Typhlosion stuttered. "It's because… I-It's because… I-I don't want to turn out like the others!"

His sudden raise in voice alarmed Giovanni and caused him to shush the cyborg. "Not so loud. Just-Just cool down."

Typhlosion took a few deep breaths and continued. "I-I'm very sorry, sir. Forgive me. B-But I-I don't want to be… emotionless. Like the prototypes…"

"Wait." Giovanni's gaze on Typhlosion tightened. "You knew of Charizard; everyone knew that; he was the first official complete cyborg. But how did you know about of the prototype cyber Pokémon? That's a top secret!"

"Prototypes…?" I whispered to myself. "He had others?"

"Umm… during one of my… modifications in the computer room on my… what was it…? Oh yeah, my Wi-Fi connection. During that mod, I saw a… Scyther in the corner, sir. But I knew it wasn't a normal Scyther. It had multiple cybernetic attachments on it and I'm sure that it was… sh-shut down, sir. I told Archer I knew that was a shut down cyborg in there and I wanted to ask him to be why it existed, because I only knew of the…Charizard incident, sir. He told me the truth."

Giovanni sighed. "I've got to talk to Archer about that later… For right now, just… go back to your room and get some sleep."

"Yes, sir." Typhlosion nodded.

"But I must warn you; this is your second strike. One more and you're out of the game."

The cyborg gulped nervously. "Y-Yes sir."

"You're dismissed."

With that, Ty left the office and began to walk back down a dark hallway, away from me. I was about to follow when…

"Raikou?" came Giovanni's voice. "You were spying on me this whole time?"

I turned my head towards him. "Well… yes."

"Well then… come in here. I was going to call for you anyway."

"Fine." I walked into his office and sat myself down on the floor ahead of his desk. I held my head up high and proud as he spoke to me; "Hmm… haven't seen you since you threw your saliva on my face."

"A moment I'm ever so proud of." I smirked.

"Right… do that again and you're a dead 'Mon."

I shrugged my shoulders. "That figures. So, what did you want me in here for, anyway?"

"First off, I never gave you the room number where your Pokéball will be kept. At the end of the day, you are expected to seal yourself back in your ball. You will remain in there until dawn the next day. Your room number is #072."

"Anything else?"

The Rocket Boss smirked. "I was curious as to how you are enjoying your stay here."

My left eyes began to twitch like crazy upon hearing that. "My stay?" I whispered to him quietly. "MY STAY?" I screamed at Giovanni, turning my voice up by more than a few decibels. I stood up on my hind legs and slammed my front paws onto his desk.

"First, you capture me against my will and bring me here! Then, your scientists performed some kind of freaky analysis that scared the living daylights out of me! After that, you pretty much tore me apart when you tested my powers! You know very well that an Electric Pokémon can't do a damned thing do a Ground-type! Finally, I get to spend a night with your Garchomps! That was the worst night of my life, and that's even including the time Entei spiked the punch at Giratina's birthday party! WHY THE HELL DO YOU THINK I'M ENJOYING MY STAY IN THIS PRISON?"

There goes my temper again.

My insane shouting had stunned Giovanni so much that he fell out of his chair and onto the floor. He seemed to recover quickly from the shock though, and he stood back up to face me.

"Listen here, Raikou. No Pokémon who enters this facility to work for us will ever leave. Never. There is not a single Pokémon who escaped here, and hasn't been recaptured. You're stuck here for as long as you live; I suggest you make the best of it. Do you understand?"

"…"

"Raikou?"

And with that final word, I left his office with nothing more to say.

* * *

><p>I was walking around in the hallway, looking among the corridors for a route to the cafeteria. He had to have one somewhere; it would be a bit weird if he didn't. I caught up to Victor who was ahead of me, walking in the same direction.<p>

"Hey, Victor."

The Infernape turned his head to the side and saw me strolling next to him.

"Hi Raikou." he greeted me. "What did you find out about Ty? He's going to be OK, right?"

"Well… Giovanni said this was Ty's second strike. One more and he's out."

"Oh boy…"

"There's… something else, as well."

We both stopped walking and turned to each other.

"Something else? Like what?"

"Typhlosion said he knew of prototype cyborgs before him. He said that he didn't want to turn out like they did."

Victor seemed a bit hesitant to ask more info from me, but asked anyway; "How… how did they turn out?"

"…"

"…O-On second thought, maybe I don't need to know yet." the Infernape stuttered.

"But something else still has me baffled." I brought up.

"…What?"

"Why would Typhlosion lie to me? He told me that he's grown to accept himself… but… what happened earlier in the break room… not to mention he nearly broke down in front of Giovanni… it says otherwise."

Victor sighed and began to talk to me. "Raikou… something you need to know… Ty's my best friend; we share everything. When he first became a cyborg, back when he was a Quilava… saying he freaked would be the understatement of the decade. He… he had a complete and total mental breakdown when he discovered what he was. I was his best friend; I wasn't going to freak just because he was different now. He still… really struggles with it. He doesn't like to let a whole lot of people know; that's why he must've lied to you. Raikou… don't let him know I told you any of this, promise?"

"…I promise, Victor. I'm a 'Mon of my word."

"Thanks Raikou. It means a lot."

"By the way, there's something else…" I sighed dramatically.

"Umm… w-what would that be…"

"…Do you where the cafeteria is? I'm starving!"

Victor remained motionless for a few seconds, and then did a double-take. "Raikou!" he shouted. "Don't scare me like that!"

I chuckled as we got up and began to walk again.

Infernape rolled his eyes as he told me, "The cafeteria is just a little up ahead. Keep walking until you hit a 4-way split, and then turn right. The cafeteria will be in plain sight ahead of you."

"Thanks."

"I'll come with you; I'm kinda hungry myself, too."

We walked quietly in the hallways; all throughout the trip, my mind kept drifting back to Typhlosion. He lied to me… Though to be fair, I couldn't really blame him. He had to struggle with becoming something completely different. Part robot… I could never imagine myself in that situation. I just hope things turn out well for him.

Victor and I arrived at the cafeteria and entered the large area. Inside, there weren't really many Pokémon or people. I looked at the clock across the room.

_"10 already? Is it really that late?"_

In fact, there was only one 'Mon in there besides us. It was large, extremely large. It looked like a black dragon with a generator… for its tail. He or she was sitting at a table in the center of the cafeteria. I decided to walk over.

"Who are you?" the 'Mon asked with a gruff voice. I instantly assumed that it preferred the 'male' gender.

I introduced myself to him. "I'm Raikou, one of the Legendary Beasts of Johto. And you?"

"…Name's Zekrom. How'd you end up in this nightmare?"

I sighed. "I got kidnapped from my cave near the Burned Tower in Johto. This is my first day here."

"Try 6 years." snarked Zekrom.

"ARE YOU FREAKIN' SERIOUS?"

The black dragon sighed. "Today marks the 2,190th day I've been trapped here. The 6th year anniversary of my capture from Unova…"

"Wow… and I thought I had it hard. Can they… seriously keep you here for that long?"

"Team Rocket has state of the art tracking technology. There's nowhere you can go where they can't find you. Heh heh. And I thought Team Plasma was a pain…"

"Team Plasma? I don't think I've ever heard of them…" I pondered to try to recall a possible memory out of my brain but no such luck.

"Team Plasma members are essentially animal rights activists TO THE EXTREME. At least, that's what Ghetsis; the lead sage of Team Plasma would have you to believe. He wanted people to give up Pokémon because he claimed it was equivalent to slavery. But surprise, surprise; he only had citizens try to do that because he wanted to not so secretly rule the world. Duh."

"How DID you get kidnapped? I mean, you look WAY more capable of defending yourself than I am!"

Zekrom sighed. "They didn't even have to battle me… It was much more effective for them to threaten the one I love… Reshiram." Upon saying those words, Zekrom shed some tears.

He continued; "It was our wedding day. She and I were to marry and live a wonderful life together. We had so much in store for us: a solid marriage, having children, watching them grow up and have their own kids…"

Zekrom briefly had to stop to take some deep breaths to regain himself. "OK, that's better. But… we had so much in store and… Team Rocket took all of that away. Giovanni… and many of his grunts came to the castle which I took residence in after the events of Team Plasma. Reshiram took residence in Anville Town. She was going to move in with me after the wedding… Giovanni… had everything perfectly staged. I woke up that morning to see Giovanni. He ordered me to come with him or else I would see the one I love be blown to pieces. Naturally, at first, I didn't believe him. Then he showed me a picture he had taken of her, timestamped at 4:30 a.m. that morning. It was very clear that I saw a strange spherical gray device planted in her skin. It WAS a bomb. Giovanni wasn't bluffing. I had chosen to go with him, to keep Reshiram alive. I never saw her again… Today is the 6th anniversary of what was to be our wedding day."

"I-I-I'm sorry, Zekrom. I wish I could help you."

"Someday," he whispered. Then his voice began to escalate, "Someday, before I die, I WILL get out of this prison and I WILL see Reshiram again! You can bet a million dollars on it!"

I grinned at the black dragon's eagerness. "Someday, I'm getting out of here, too."

"I can third that." agreed Victor. "But right now, it's getting really late. I think it's about time we all hit the sack. We'll need to be prepared for tomorrow."

"All right." Zekrom finished the last of what he was eating then threw the remains in the trash. After he left the room, Victor and I followed.

"Victor, do you where room #072 is? That's where Giovanni said my Pokéball was kept…"

"Yeah, I know where that is. I have the same room. Just follow me."

It wasn't a long walk from the cafeteria; in fact, it took maybe less than 2 minutes to get there. After following Victor down some of the almost maze-like corridors, we reached our room.

"Our Pokéballs are going to be in here." the Infernape told me. "Just let yourself in, and then we'll need to get out tomorrow morning."

I walked into the room with him. Pokéballs were on rows of shelves inside; they were sorted by Primary Type and then alphabetically. Victor seemed to know exactly where his Pokéball was. With a push of a button, his being transformed into energy and he was recalled inside. I found my ball with my insignia imprinted on it in the Electric section of the room.

I sighed to myself, looking at my reflection on the ball.

"Entei… Suicune… I'm getting out of here someday. Wait for me."

With that, I recalled myself inside, wondering what would await me tomorrow.

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © NintendoGame Freak_

Inorganic is probably the most dramatic chapter in this story I've written so far. I've even cried a few moments while typing this (yes, I am overly emotional). Several things become truth now: Typhlosion lied to Raikou; the cyborg is still struggling to accept himself. Charizard wasn't the first cyborg Team Rocket made; there were prototypes before him that were emotionless and Ty doesn't want to end up that same way. Raikou blows up at Giovanni again… go figure. And it seems the electric tiger wasn't the first Legend here…

Again, I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Be sure to Read & Review!


	8. Meet Up With the Bug Catcher!

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 8: Meet Up With the Bug Catcher!

Hey there, I'm up with a new chapter of Slaves and Soldiers. I have to say, out of all my stories so far, this one is possibly the most fun to me to write. I know in the last two chapters, I bombed you guys with drama. To balance it out, this chapter is mostly humor-oriented. Again, hope you enjoy!

* * *

><p>It was another beautiful morning across the regions of Johto and Kanto. The sun was bright and the day was full of hope. Back inside the Viridian City hotel, Lyra was already up and getting dressed in the bathroom while Ethan was trying to get a few more precious minutes of sleep. Lyra poked her head out of the bathroom door to check on Ethan.<p>

"Ethan! What are you doing still asleep?"

Ethan turned over from his back to his stomach and stuffed his head under the hotel pillow.

"Get up!" she shouted.

Ethan slowly moved his head from under his pillow and put his eyes onto the digital clock. "Lyra… It's 8:00 on a Saturday morning. Just give me a few more minutes…" With that, he promptly returned to sleeping.

Lyra groaned. Now REALLY wasn't the time for Ethan to be sleeping in. They had a job to do and two Legendary Beasts to find.

The ticked off teen looked over to Suicune, who was now lying on Lyra's bed. She wasn't off in Dreamland like Ethan, though. She was staring straight at Ethan, with her formula for getting the lazy teenager up already completed.

"Suicune, could you wake Ethan up? I need to go downstairs and grab some breakfast before we go."

Suicune only gave Lyra a simple nod and a smirk as she left the hotel room.

"All right, Ethan…" she chuckled. "If you don't want to do this the easy way…" She stood up on Lyra's bed and aimed her body towards the slumbering teenager. "Then we'll just have to do this the hard way. Scald!"

Suicune hurled her head and threw it back forward, with impossibly boiling hot water streaming out of her mouth. The water made full force contact with Ethan, who immediately jumped out of bed, NAKED, and ran to the bathroom as fast as humanly possible.

"HOT! HOT! HOT! HOT! HOT! HOOOOOOOOOOOT!" he screamed as he desperately tried to turn on an ice-cold shower.

"Why, thank you." the wolf smiled. "I never knew you thought me as beautiful."

The shower finally came on and soothing ice-cold water came through the shower head (Hey, it'd be soothing if YOU were soaked head to toe with boiling hot water). A massive sigh of relief could be heard from the bathroom. The white wolf couldn't help but literally LOL.

"AHAHAHA! AHAHAHA! OHHH! You should have seen your face, Ethan! It was absolutely priceless! AHAHAHAHA! *sigh* I missed moments like this…"

Once Ethan had cooled down, he came out of the bathroom (fortunately, he was clothed this time). His face was still red from the boiling water. He looked at Suicune.

"You are evil, you know that? You and your ways haven't changed a bit."

"Nope. How else do you think I get Raikou and Entei up in the morning?"

"Whatever." the young adult sighed. "Where did Lyra go?"

"She went down to get breakfast. You should probably get some, too."

"But what about you, Suicune? I mean, we came here late last night. How are we supposed to get you out without everybody trying to catch you? You're a Legendary, after all."

"I see your point. Hmm… Do you have a spare Pokéball?"

"Well… yes, I always keep a few on hand. Why do you ask? Wait… do you mean you want to…"

"I see no problem in it. Ethan, you've caught me before, and you have certainly proved yourself to be way beyond most trainers today. You know, I still see trainers struggling to get their Pokémon to listen to them. They often go about the wrong way. Whether they yell at them for not listening or they just try to push their Pokémon too far, they certainly aren't Pokémon League material. You have the right tactics, Ethan. You never push your Pokémon beyond what they're capable of and you get along with them so well. Look at your Feraligatr."

The two looked ahead of them to see Feraligatr, still napping on the floor of the room.

"You two are still best friends after so many years. A lot of trainers would have tried to trade up their own starter to a more powerful Pokémon. But you didn't do that. You just encouraged for your own to become stronger. It looks like he did; you must've won a lot of Leagues with him."

"Well… yeah, I suppose. I don't really like to brag."

"You _were _always so modest for a young man. Ethan… it would be an honor for me to work with you again."

"If you want to put it that way…" Ethan reached into his backpack and pulled out a standard issue Pokéball.

"GO! POKÉBALL!"

He tossed the ball with as much vigor as he had back in the days of his early childhood. The ball tapped Suicune and she was sucked up into it. It closed and landed back on the ground.

First shake…

Second shake…

Third shake…

And then came that ever so satisfying CLICK!

Ethan smiled as he picked the Pokéball back up and attached it to his belt. "I'll let you out once we get out of the hotel." he told Suicune.

"Buddy! Come on, let's go!"

Buddy the Feraligatr looked up to Ethan from his comfortable curled position on the ground and stood up to him.

"Breakfast?"

"Yeah, breakfast is downstairs. Race ya?"

* * *

><p>"Get back here, Buddy! Why do you have to be so fast for such a big brute?"<p>

The trainer and his Feraligatr were dashing down the hotel's stairway at super speed, with Buddy being significantly further ahead of him. Fortunately, the stairway completely deserted except for the two of them; otherwise, Buddy definitely would have caused some broken bones.

Ethan struggled to catch up with his old pal; he was a full story behind the blue alligator. He began to gripe with himself.

"I just HAD to get a room on the twelfth floor, didn't I? 'No', they said 'Take the Master Suite, you're the Johto Champion! We'll give it to you for no charge!' Sometimes, I hate being so famous."

"Quit your gripin'!" Buddy yelled to Ethan from the fourth floor. "You should be glad! I mean, I know I am! I never dreamed that we could be so famous! They're even selling plush toys of us!"

"Plush toys?" he shouted as he continued his descent. "They've started selling plush toys of us now? Just great…"

Buddy stopped running once he reached the ground floor. "You know…" he began. "To answer your earlier question…"

Ethan slowed his running to a walk at the second floor and slowly descended from there.

"Yeah?"

"You know I used to be a really slow guy. Most trainers would have traded me up to a faster, more accurate water-type by now. You never let go of me. You pushed me to my limits and… I became so much more than I should've been."

Ethan couldn't help but smile softly. "Buddy… I would never. You're my first ever Pokémon… well, kinda. You always meant so much to me. To trade you off just for someone better would be absolutely heartless."

"But you know how many trainers would trade up their starter for a Legendary?"

"Unfortunately, a few too many."

Ethan finally reached the bottom and rejoined his Feraligatr. The duo walked through the door and into the main hallway. They headed straight to the breakfast bar.

"Speaking of first Pokémon…" the blue reptilian mentioned. "Whatever did happen to that Cyndaquil? You know the one you told me you had before he just… disappeared. Did ya ever find out?"

"Well… no, actually. I wish I _did _know. The only thing I can think of is that he just… ran away. After that, Professor Elm gave me you. I can't figure out why he would run away."

"Don't know why he would. You're one of the best trainers I've ever seen. Maybe even better than Red. I consider myself blessed to someone like you for a trainer."

"RED?" His shout caused more than a few weird looks from people. "That's… kinda exaggerating a little bit, don't you think?"

Buddy thought about this about two seconds before he replied, "No."

"…Still wish I knew where that Cyndaquil went."

"Well, whatever happened to him, he's probably all right. He's probably fully evolved by now, as well. Pokémon are tough creatures."

"That's for sure."

The two grabbed what they wanted: Ethan took eggs, a banana, and some cereal with milk. Buddy nabbed ham, sausage, bacon, and anything that was once alive. The two found Lyra who was sitting by herself at a table near the hotel entrance.

"Hey, guys!"

Ethan and Buddy sat down into a pair of chairs next to her and scooted up to the table.

"Hey, Lyra. Got your breakfast already?"

"I'm already done! We could be on our way to Celadon City right now if…"

"Oh sure. Blame the guy who just wanted a few more minutes of sleep." Ethan chuckled.

Lyra smirked. "I'm guessing Suicune managed to get you up?"

"Yes. She sprayed me with boiling hot water." he told Lyra through gritted teeth. "Let's just leave it at that."

Lyra couldn't help but laugh at the poor trainer. "Oh, all right." she told him in between chuckles. "Wait, where is Suicune? Is she still upstairs?"

Ethan didn't say a word. Instead, he took one of his Pokéballs off of his belt and set it on the table for Lyra to see.

Lyra stared at the Pokéball for a few moments. Ethan's sudden Pokéball presentation and his silence left Lyra with little to say. Ethan always had the tendency to completely shut up and become a mime at times. She picked up the ball and brought it up to eye level. Finally, Lyra asked, "OK. I give. Who am I supposed to be at?"

Ethan stared at her with his jaw slowly and quietly dropping to the table. He managed to lift it back up and carefully reattach it to his skull. "Are you seriously THAT clueless, Lyra?"

The other teen jerked back from the table, quite obviously offended. "Hey! You think I'm an idiot?" Lyra's yelling certainly attracted more attention than Ethan wanted at this point. Ethan looked somewhat nervously around the breakfast area at curious beings, people and their Pokémon alike.

"Jeez. Calm down, Lyra. People are staring."

Lyra looked around to see the trainers intrigued to their conversation. She was more than obviously embarrassed.

"Oh. Sorry." She sat calmly back down on her chair.

Ethan sighed. "In case the hints and gestures weren't obvious enough for you…" he said grudgingly. "Suicune's in here."

Lyra slowly began to process it Ethan's words through her head. They entered her mind and went to the translation center of her brain. They promptly checked in and began their route to the processing factory. It took a few minutes to get there. Finally, the words reached the processing factory and went through vocal commands and straight out of Lyra's mouth.

"YOU HAVE SUICUNE?"

They came out a little bit too quickly.

This time, her shouting caught the attention of nearby trainers, both amateurs and experts.

"What?"

"Did she say…"

"Does he really have…"

"SUICUNE?"

They looked at Ethan eagerly and began to race for their prize.

"RUN!"

The duo, along with the bulky reptilian Buddy ran as fast as humanly (and Pokémon …ly …) possible. Lyra and Buddy quickly ran around a couch while Ethan was heading straight for it in the lounge area. His quick thinking and athletics let him jump over the couch unexplainably slowing down time. After landing on the floor in a spectacular fashion, time resumed its normal flow. He rejoined Lyra and his Feraligatr; they ran out of the hotel with Lyra asking,

"How did you DO that?"

"The jump? Lyra, you know I've been in athlet-"

"No, how did you do the slowing down time part? Did you do that just to look cool?"

"…Maybe."

Lyra could only groan as the two teens distanced themselves from the hotel (and the Legendary-obsessed trainers). After a while, they slowed down their pace and started to casually walk. The two looked around them. The buildings of Viridian City were now getting sparse and trees began to slowly creep up ahead of them. After a bit of thinking, Ethan chuckled.

"Looks like we're on Route 2."

Lyra took a longer note of where they were before she recognized the route.

"This IS Route 2, isn't it?" the teenager realized. "We've been so busy on our journeys in Hoenn…"

"And Sinnoh…"

"And Unova…"

"That we haven't been back here in forever. I remember it pretty well. Buddy and I had JUST defeated the Johto League and… it was so great. Being able to explore Kanto afterwards… it was exhilarating to come here. I could only dream of going of Kanto; I've wanted to explore Kanto all my life. Walking down this route for the first time… not knowing what would lie ahead or what I could encounter was just awesome. Plainly and simply awesome. Hoenn, Sinnoh, and Unova were all great, but they couldn't beat the thrill of taking on Kanto and Johto for me."

Lyra smiled softly as she remembered her first journey here too. Unlike Ethan, Lyra never went into Pokémon training professionally. She was only 18; she hadn't decided what exactly she wanted to do with her life yet. Ethan had already been dead set on becoming a Pokémon Master. And that was exactly what he had achieved. He had defeated the Gym Leaders, challenged the Elite Four, and bested the Champion of the Johto League, a feat absolutely unheard of from a 10-year-old! 8 years later and that same kid also defeated the Hoenn, Sinnoh, and Unova Leagues. Lyra wasn't going to try to outdo him; she knew that she never could. Nevertheless, she still traveled with Ethan when he explored Kanto for the first time. Even though she wasn't there for battling, it was still an exciting experience for her.

The duo walked into Viridian Forest. Just beyond it was Pewter City, which would be the first stop towards reaching Celadon City, where Eusine lived and where he was holding Entei captive.

At this point, Ethan decided it would be an opportune time to let Suicune out of her new Pokéball. The trainer tossed it up in the air and red energy shot out, rematerializing itself as the Aurora Pokémon, Suicune.

"Ah, kind of feels good to be out of there." she told Ethan.

"You haven't exactly been in there for that long." the Champion pointed out to her.

She shrugged her shoulders as the quartet of Lyra, Ethan, Buddy, and Suicune trekked into Viridian Forest and continued the journey to Pewter City.

* * *

><p>Not too long after exploring Viridian Forest, Ethan happened to run into an all too familiar Bug Catcher…<p>

"OUR EYES HAVE MET!" he declared with a loud enough voice to wake the dead. "AND NOW WE MUST BATTLE!"

"Wait! But…"

It was too late. Rules are rules. If you make eye contact with a Pokémon trainer and they challenge you to a battle, you must accept, regardless if their Pokémon are MASSIVELY ahead of you in level.

Though, this situation was reversed for our dear friend Ethan. He currently only had two Pokémon with him, but that was because he hadn't planned on starting any battles with opposing trainers; otherwise, he would have brought an organized party. Even so, a Level 100 Feraligatr and the Legendary Pokémon Suicune alone would be more than enough to take most trainers down. This Bug Catcher was no exception.

"Hold on, have we battled before?"

"YES! IT IS I; BUG CATCHER STACEY AND I WILL DEFEAT YOU WITH MY ENTIRE TEAM OF METAPODS!"

"…"

"…"

"…"

"…"

"…What?"

Ethan then pulled off an impressive anime-style faint before jumping back up.

"It can't be you! You were the kid who challenged me 8 years ago to a Pokémon battle… with nothing BUT Metapods! I kicked your ass… and you challenge me again… with NOTHING BUT METAPODS! 8 freakin' years, dude!"

"…They're Level 100." he replied meekly.

"All. It. Knows. Is. Harden." Ethan told him, clearly and slowly enunciating each word to make sure the Bug Catcher would understand him.

"METAPOD, USE HARDEN!"

Yeah, it didn't work.

"…Buddy." Ethan sighed, facing his reptilian friend. "Would you mind…?"

Buddy smirked. "Not a problem, Boss. Just say the move and I'm right there."

Ethan slowly brought his lips up to a smile. "Surprise me."

Buddy rushed towards the Metapod and jumped high in the air. He dove back down headfirst and chomped into it deeply with ice-cold fangs. He leaped back to give Metapod a chance to go.

Nope, no chance to go. The Metapod had fainted from just one attack of the reptilian alligator's moveset.

"DARN IT!" he cursed (well no, that doesn't really count as cursing).

Ethan groaned, already getting tired of this stubborn Bug Catcher holding them up. Now more than ever, Ethan wanted to sock the guy and just leave him there dead for the Bug Pokémon to eat him.

Of course, it didn't help him that kind of action was against the rules.

"Now can we leave?" Ethan sighed, wanting to just get on his way now. Lyra, Buddy, and Suicune shared similar feelings.

"NO! I STILL HAVE TWO MORE METAPODS LEFT! I CAN'T LOSE!"

"FINE!"

The Bug Catcher then sent out… surprise, surprise, another Metapod.

"METAPOD!" the Bug Catcher shouted. "USE HARDEN!"

Metapod obeyed its' master's commands and used harden to increase its' defense. In the end, this didn't make any difference for Buddy, who easily KO'ed Metapod with another Ice Fang.

Ethan gritted his teeth. This wasn't the time to get caught up in a silly battle with a heck of an idiot Bug Catcher. They had to get going and find Entei, who knows what Eusine's doing with him.

"LOOK, IF YOU DON'T MIND, I'M JUST GOING TO TAKE MY-"

"NO!" the Bug Catcher shouted again, this time loud enough for the aliens on Mars to gripe at him. "I'VE STILL ONE MORE METAPOD LEFT! WE CAN WIN THIS! WE CAN DEFEAT-"

Ethan's final strand of sanity snapped. He stomped over to the poor Bug Catcher and punched him in his face as hard as he possibly could. He fell over and next to a nearby tree, bleeding unconsciously.

"Screw the rules. Come on guys, let's get going. You didn't see anything."

The remaining three looked at Ethan with various reactions to what he had done. Lyra was disgusted that Ethan would do something so graphic. Of course, she probably didn't take into account that when most people are in a rush to get somewhere, they usually tend to royally screw the official rules over.

Buddy was shocked that Ethan was capable of something like that. Normally, he was a very calm and understanding guy. Sure, everyone had their flaws, but Ethan had few. Unfortunately, one of those few flaws was the lack of the virtue of patience.

And Suicune was… quite impressed, actually. She was definitely won over by Ethan's guts to do something so reckless. But let's not forget, Ethan's the Johto Champion. A few million dollars will shut most people up very easily.

With that out of the way, the quartet continued to journey to Pewter City, where Raikou had been only one day earlier. But for right now, her and the others' focus was dead set on finding Entei.

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo Game Freak_

Looks like Ethan has lost his patience with our Bug Catcher Stacey. I don't blame him; what kind of idiot trainer goes around with nothing but Metapods, anyway? Wait, scratch that; I can name a lot of NPCs...

I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter. And again, don't forget to R&R! Or fav. Either one works.


	9. Feed the Machine

Slaves and Soldiers

A/N: Twelve reviews in two months? Well… better than some stories I guess… For those of you who have reviewed, I thank you. For those of you who haven't… please review. Please.

* * *

><p>Chapter 9: Feed the Machine<p>

'3:11 A.M.' the clock said.

I sighed, thinking to myself as I twisted and turned around my Pokéball simulation, trying to come up with any good ideas on how to get out of this business I've been trapped into. Zekrom already said that he's been here for six years. If he's tried to get out of here for six years and he hasn't escaped yet… well… it certainly does say something about Team Rocket's determination. Ty's story wasn't much different; he had gotten out before, during the first time Ethan destroyed the organization. Team Rocket took a long time to recover from that loss, but they eventually did. Then they found Ty again. If neither of them could escape Team Rocket, then why would I even stand half a chance?

I closed my eyes, trying to go back to sleep again.

'4:05 A.M.'

I pushed the clock away as I stood myself up. I began to pace nervously around the false river, too distracted to head back to sleep.

_"Am I stuck here for the rest of my life?" _I wondered. _"No… I can't be; I just can't. There's some way out; I'll find it. Maybe Zekrom and Typhlosion just… no. From what I know from them, both of them have tried to escape here for years… and no such luck. Is this going to be how the rest of my life plays out? Just doomed here, forced to work for Team Rocket for as long as I live?"_

I walked back over to the small blanket that I was sleeping on. I set myself down, closed my eyes, and tried to return to the comfort of sleep.

*BEEP* *BEEP* *BEEP* *BEEP* *BE-

KRAKOW!

"Stupid alarm… Why did they have to install an alarm in that clock?"

I looked towards the now deep-fried clock. '6:00 A.M.' was still barely visible on it. 6:00… really? Even Suicune didn't wake me up that early. Why does Team Rocket do this…? I decided that it would be best to just shut my mouth and get out of the damn Pokéball, before someone else did it for me. I mentally unlocked the Pokéball's preservation lock (not the restraining lock; I can't undo that one) and released myself back into the room I was in last night. I found Victor already releasing himself from his Pokéball, too.

"Morning, Victor." I told him flatly, with zero enthusiasm.

Victor gave a small chuckle. "Why are you such a Mr. Grumpypants this morning?"

"Oh… I don't know…" I replied with my voice dripping in sarcasm. "Maybe because I HATE TEAM ROCKET."

Victor set his hand on my shoulder. "You are FAR from alone, buddy. I think I can speak for everyone when I say no 'Mon here has ANY admiration for Team Rocket."

"Well, haven't you tried escaping?"

"We did. Zekrom, Typhlosion, and I all staged a huge plan to get out of here. We each had different reasons for wanting to get out. Zekrom wanted to get back to Unova. Typhlosion just wanted to try to find his old trainer, and I… I just wanted to get the hell out of here."

"Probably didn't turn out so good, I'm guessing."

"Unfortunately… we were close. We got our tracking devices off and we attempted to sneak out at night… but they caught us. Stupid security cameras, I thought I got them all… Just can't be helped, I guess."

"I suppose. So now what? Do we do the same thing that Ty and I did yesterday?"

"Yeah, pretty much. Almost every day is like this."

I groaned. "Fine. Let's just get Typhlosion and I can get this over with. Where's his room?"

Victor began to walk to the door out of the room and pushed it open. He motioned at me with his hand. "Follow me." he whispered.

We walked down an extremely confusing set of corridors where all the walls, ceiling, and floor held no difference. The walls were a constant, dull, and boring shade of gray; the ceiling tiles were perfectly aligned and equal in distance; the floor… was just ONE REALLY, REALLY BORING pale blue. The only things different in each section were the room numbers we passed by (I could not remember the path we took to save my life). After 10 mind-numbing minutes of walking, we reached a door that I had never seen before.

It was one of those doors that weren't a regular door, but kinda like one of those cool slider doors you see in sci-fi. Ehh… enough about doors.

"Where does this lead?" I asked Victor.

"This is Ty's room. He… gets a different room than the rest of us."

It didn't take a bunch of thinking to figure out why. "…Is it because of the whole being a cyborg thing?"

"That's essentially it." Victor faced a keypad next to the slider door and typed in a combination. The door slid open and we walked through.

I looked around the room, observing carefully. The room almost seemed like a lab of sorts, with various wires hanging around the room attached to all kinds of machines. The walls were metallic silver and the ceiling had about a bajillion wires dangling from the top. The only hint that this room wasn't completely a lab was a bed in the back of the room. In it was Typhlosion sleeping, with his cyborg parts hooked up to some of the wires running from him into a computer in the distance. He muttered to himself softly in his dreamland.

"Is he all right?"

"Yeah… he… needs to come here every night to charge up his battery which powers his cybernetic parts. It's… a very hard part of his life that he has to accept. But we've been friends forever; it doesn't make any difference to me."

"Hmm. Maybe it's not as cool as I thought it was." I sighed. "How… how does he take it?"

"Take what?"

"Take being a cyborg. I mean, I'm not exactly sure if I could handle that. He was… really frustrated yesterday. You saw him. Does he really think of himself as a monster?"

Victor was silent for a few moments.

"…That's something that I have to let him tell you; it's not my business."

"…I understand. Should we wake him up now?"

"Yeah, we should. We need to get ready soon."

Both of us walked up to the sleeping cyborg Pokémon and put ourselves at the opposite sides of him. Victor began to gently shake Typhlosion.

"Hey… Ty. It's morning; you gotta get up."

Ty groaned as he rotated away from Victor and faced me. "It's 6:00." he groaned. He shut his eyes and put his pillow back over his head. "The sun's not even up yet."

"But this is a windowless room." I pointed out to him.

"I have internal weather forecast. Now just give me 10 more minutes…"

"Your sleeping habits certainly haven't changed." Victor smirked. He looked over to the distant computer screen to see that his readings were perfectly fine and it was safe to detach the wires. I helped Victor do so. Now it was all right to get him out.

But he most definitely wanted to stay in that bed and refused to budge, much like a teenager on a Saturday morning. Victor and I tried to pull him out, but he latched his claw deep into the bed to stay on it. He did look pretty damn comfortable in his bed, but Victor decided to resort to different measures…

"Raikou…"

"Yes?"

"Do you have any good Electric attacks?"

"I've got Thunderbolt, Discharge; Thunder Fang… take your pick. Are you planning to…?"

"Yes, actually. There certainly doesn't seem to be any other way to…"

"All right. All right. I'm out of the bed." Typhlosion told the two of us as he walked towards us. "Just DON'T use an attack on me again. Let's not forget about the time that you used Flare Blitz, Victor…"

"Well, EXCUSE ME, but you are the hardest 'Mon I have EVER met to get up in the morning!"

Typhlosion shrugged his shoulders. "I can attest to that." Typhlosion then turned to me and sighed, with his head hanging low. "Hey… Raikou… I… completely went wacko on you yesterday. It was uncalled for. I shouldn't have lost my temper like that. I'm sorry."

I held my right paw for him to grasp, which he did with his metal claw.

"Well… it was uncalled for… but it's not entirely your fault. It probably didn't help that I set you off earlier that day. We're both to blame here."

He raised his head to look back at me. "Yeah… it's just… being a cyborg is not as cool as it sounds in science fiction. For one thing, you get stereotyped into one of those 'want to overthrow humanity and take over the world' guys. When I heard about prototype Charizard… I didn't want to end up like him. I don't want these cybernetics to consume my soul, like his did. And I'm going to make sure that they don't."

Victor placed his arm around Ty's shoulder. "Ty, they're not going to. You're my best bud and I'll make sure that you'll be all right."

"I can always count on you, Victor."

"And I'll do what I can to help you." I told the Fire types. "After all, Mom did teach me to always help those in need."

"Glad that's settled." Typhlosion smiled. "Now come on, let's head to the cafeteria before all the good food's gone."

* * *

><p>We had reached the cafeteria, where we would begin their day before receiving the assignment that Team Rocket would force us to do. We headed towards the buffet, where well-cooked food awaited us.<p>

I looked at the steaming food. "Wait… Ty."

"Yeah?" he asked at he grabbed an empty tray.

"This doesn't make any sense. I mean, isn't Team Rocket supposed to be more… unethical? Seriously? Cause… aside from the whole 'you're supposed to work for them' thing, you guys get decent treatment… Not including my first night here that is."

Victor and Typhlosion both looked me, after receiving their breakfast of hash browns and scrambled eggs.

"Victor." I said to him. "You told me earlier that no 'Mon here had ANY admiration for Team Rocket… everything seems… all right besides being trapped here."

Victor chuckled, which was beginning to appear as one of his trademarks. "You know, a LOT of new 'Mon ask that very same question, Raikou. You're far from the first. But if you think that Team Rocket was always like that… well… you'd have to be a very dumb Pokémon, to say the least."

"Do you ACTUALLY think that I believe that they're humane and ethical? Team Rocket has stirred up trouble for the last two decades and actually thinking that they changed their ways is outright stupidity. I still don't believe it."

We walked with our food to a close-by table that no one else occupied. We sat down and Ty continued to elaborate from where Victor left off.

"Before Ethan came around… every Pokémon here, the ones that have been here long enough, can testify that living here was total hell."

"You mean like a chaotic, crazy kind of hell?"

"Uhh… we're talking more along the lines of evil, torturous hell."

"Dare I ask how it was?" I posed the question to him, somewhat reluctantly.

"Only if you want to know." Ty said, then took a bite of eggs.

I sighed. _"Did I REALLY want to know how it was here? I'd feel kinda guilty if it was that horrific and I didn't stop it until Ethan came around… but I guess I should probably be informed, so I know what Team Rocket is capable of stooping to."_

I faced the Fire types with an adamant expression on my face.

"Tell me."

"OK then." Victor told me. "Guess I'll be the one to tell this story. I'll give you the condensed version. To put it very simply, living here before Ethan came along was like… like… what do I compare it to?" He stopped to think for a second. "Ah. Like being prisoners of war, in a way. Things were BEYOND crummy for everyone here. Team Rocket supplied us with the bare minimum to survive. The only times we left our Pokéballs were for training, assignments, and feeding time, once a day. You ever try living on mucky water and… whatever that moldy, crumbly stuff was?"

Typhlosion thought for a second. "I think that was SUPPOSED to be bread. 'Supposed to be' are the key words there."

"I'll put it in two words: IT. SUCKED. The concept of privileges didn't even exist."

"So… if everything sucked so much," I told him. "Then why is service… well, better now?"

"After the incident with Ethan…" Victor started. "You know what happened there, right?"

"Yeah. He was able to break down Team Rocket and destroy the organization. But they WERE able to get back together again, obviously…"

Ty nodded as he finished the last of his hash browns. "Team Rocket's only being this nice to avoid stirring up larger controversy and getting Ethan onto their backs again. They brought those changes, you know like certain privileges and more lenient punishments, to their work to keep the Johto Government out of their business."

"Hmm. Well, that would make sense. Guess it's not the worst it could be for all of us. Still won't stop me from trying to find a way out. Is it time for us to…?"

"Yeah, actually it is. Let's go."

"Wait… Victor."

Victor turned to me after dumping the rest of his food in the trash can. "Yeah?"

"There's been something on my mind that won't leave me alone which I need an answer to. It involves you."

"…I think I know what you're talking about. Typhlosion, you told him, didn't you?"

"Well… yeah."

"Was it really you?" I asked the Infernape. "Are you seriously… the one who murdered Looker?"

"I'm not going to lie to you. Yeah. It was me."

"How could you…?"

"Raikou, there's something you've got to understand. Changes in the system or not, one way or another, you WILL be forced to do things you don't want to. It's not like I held anything against him, but… Team Rocket needed him out of the way and… I did Ty a favor." Victor sighed. "Let's… just not talk about it, OK?"

I sighed. "I gotcha. Guess we need to get over to that small room again. Where is it?"

"Actually, we're not going back there." Typhlosion said to me.

"But I thought…"

"No. We only went there to use the assignment sheets because the main computer's database was broken down. It had been acting up the last couple of weeks, but it should been in working order now. The sheets are what Team Rocket uses when their computers act up. You would be surprised how often that happens…"

We dumped the rest of their food and returned the trays to where we had gotten them. After that, we promptly took their leave from the cafeteria. I followed Victor and Typhlosion through the confusing corridors of the hallway. Another question popped up in my mind.

"Hey, where's Zekrom? I didn't see him in the cafeteria."

"He probably already received his assignment and is heading out on it." Victor told me. "He's an early riser."

"I'm not." Typhlosion and I somehow said in perfect sync.

"Like I didn't know…" Victor playfully pushed Typhlosion.

"Hey! Heh heh."

I observed the two 'Mon. Victor and Typhlosion really WERE best friends. It was great to see such a genuine friendship between two Pokémon. It seemed that what happened to Typhlosion didn't hurt their relationship at all.

We opened up the door we had stopped in front of and entered the room. It was a medium-sized room, about the size of a master bedroom. Many fancy high-tech gadgets and gizmos were spaced around in the room. A computer terminal was on the other side from the entrance we came in.

"The database is on that terminal. It contains the jobs that we're supposed to pull off." the cyborg 'Mon told me. "Let's see what's up for today."

All three of us walked to the terminal, but Typhlosion was the one who powered up the computer. He began to maneuver his way through it. "Now that the database is back in working order," he said. "I should be able to download the mission data."

From his pack through a small hole emerged a…

"A USB cable?" I raised my eyebrows, somewhat surprised. "Just HOW much stuff did they load into you?"

"More than you'd think. Sometimes, I think Team Rocket went overboard with the features…"

He plugged the USB cable into the computer's USB port and immediately accessed the database. He used the computer's touch screen to scan through the listed assignments and searched for his. "Hmm. This is an interesting one I've got this time."

"You caught my curiosity." I told the cyborg. "What is it?"

"It's some kind of… cult… that Team Rocket wants me to converse with at the Ruins of Alph. For some reason, they SPECIFICALLY want me to go."

"A… cult?" muttered Victor. "Alone?"

Typhlosion's eyes went wide open. "ALONE? HELL NO! I am NOT going to risk my hide against some sort of weird, crazy, possibly Satanic cult ALONE!"

"Good." nodded Victor. "I wasn't gonna let you have all the fun with them anyway."

"I'm definitely in." I told them with vigor burning in my soul. "If I can't kick Team Rocket's asses, then those crackpots' will have to do."

"So what DOES Team Rocket want from this cult anyway?" Victor questioned.

Typhlosion turned his eyes back to the computer monitor. "Hmm. It seems that this cult has their hands on some prototypes for…" He stopped for a second, looking at the text onscreen in silence.

"Typhlosion… what is it? What does Team Rocket want prototype plans for?"

The cyborg was unsteady in his words. "…A-Assimilation technology."

We all stopped to take in what Typhlosion had just said. Team Rocket wants to get their hands on assimilation technology… The consequences of them wielding that power… it could be catastrophic.

I tried to break the somber mood. "…Well, maybe the cult ISN'T twisted and Satanic."

"And that makes a difference to Team Rocket's goals… how?"

"Hey, I'm just trying to stay positive!"

Typhlosion rubbed his forehead with his organic paw, sighing. "We're gonna have to do it anyway. Let's… Let's just do this."

* * *

><p>It's interesting. 8 years ago, Team Rocket only ran in Kanto and Johto, dealing simply with matters that involved Pokémon. After their re-building and recovery, they are one of the biggest criminal syndicates in the entire Pokémon World, also having bases in Hoenn, Sinnoh, and Unova. They now dealt with many manners besides Pokémon. Drug trafficking, corrupting politicians and even identity theft to gain access to beneficial resources were now in their agenda. Team Rocket was no longer above anything.<p>

Now, we had to head to the Ruins of Alph from the evil team's main headquarters in Mahogany Town. I didn't know what to do about meeting up with a cult that dabbled with assimilation technology. If we do get it…Team Rocket IS going to use it on Pokémon, without a doubt. If they can figure out the prototype plans and build a complete model, then every Pokémon in the Kanto and Johto regions may have to work for them.

But… despite how bad the results would be if they had that technology… I had to do it. I HAD to. I didn't know what Team Rocket would do to Typhlosion and Victor if they didn't comply. But for me… I wasn't going to subject myself to that torture again; I wasn't!

I looked at the metal device attached to my wrist again.

Stupid tracking device.

Stupid drugs inside this damned device.

Stupid Team Rocket.

* * *

><p>We finally stood at the entrance to the Ruins of Alph. Just standing in front of the entrance to the Ruins gave off an unmistakably dark and eerie vibe. We didn't know what might lay ahead in these Ruins that belonged to the Unown. All three of us were having second thoughts about turning back.<p>

"You know…" I told my two teammates. "I can't help but feel that there's something… familiar… about this place."

"You've been here before?" the flaming monkey asked.

"No… but my counterpart Suicune has. After that incident at Greenfield a couple of years back, we all wondered how the Unown could be powerful enough to generate an illusionary Entei. All of Johto, including us, thought they were weak and powerless. Suicune wanted to know more, so she came here just a few months ago."

"Did she find anything?" wondered Typhlosion.

"Well… we let her leave to investigate the Ruins of Alph… a week later, we hadn't heard back from her. Entei and I got pretty worried. Both of us agreed that while he would go to the Ruins to find Suicune, I could stay to make sure no further trouble ran amok in Johto. Entei brought her back all right… unconscious and almost comatose. Fortunately, she woke up with no serious conditions. We asked her what happened, but all she could remember was that she came across the Unown and a cloaked man with them… nothing more."

"Hmm. We'd best be on our toes."

Slowly and cautiously, we approached the Ruins of Alph and walked inside.

The Ruins were quiet, but not a calming sort of quiet. It was the eerie, lurking, ferocious quiet. We could clearly hear our own footsteps as we walked through the enormous passageway. I looked on the sides of the chamber and saw Unown hieroglyphics decorating the walls. I couldn't read those, but Suicune had knowledge of this kind of thing. Either way, seeing these did nothing to calm my rattled nerves. We walked for… I'd say about 5 minutes before we reached a 4-way split.

"Guess we're going to have to split up." I told them. "I'll take the middle path."

"I got the right." Victor claimed.

"Leaves me with the left." Typhlosion shrugged.

"OK, if any of us find the crazy cult that we're supposed to deal with, try to stay hidden until the others come back around. Got it?"

"Yeah."

"Let's do this."

* * *

><p>I walked down the center path, not finding much of interest. The hieroglyphics had faded away on my path, so even if I was interested, I couldn't read them. No other special decorations were on the path and it made for one dull trip.<p>

"Boring. Boring. More boring." I griped to myself. "Wonder if the others are having more fun?"

* * *

><p>Typhlosion kept his pace as he walked down his path. So far, he hadn't encountered anybody but he did take note of the hieroglyphics on the walls. It began to deviate away from the Unown and onto technology, showing pictures of the Unown and other Pokémon slowly changing to a mechanical form. Somewhat unsteadily, he continued to walk down his path.<p>

More hieroglyphics came up. The technology in the hieroglyphics became even more prevalent. By now, the Pokémon on the walls were no longer in their natural, organic forms. They had headgear strapped to their heads, cannons attached to their arms, and metal fused onto their bodies. Typhlosion was horrified to see the grim expressions on the Pokémons' face, begging to be released from their prison.

"What IS this cult?" he silently said to himself.

Finally, he came to a dead end on his route. The final picture… was not pretty. It was HIM. He saw HIMSELF in the hieroglyphics. Laughing manically. He was standing on a flaming stone, holding up separate objects in each hand. In his left organic paw, he clutched a skull. The skull of whom, he did not know. In his metal claw, he held a glowing high-tech helmet and inside it was the face of Typhlosion's best friend…

"AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!"

* * *

><p>Victor was walking down the right path, slightly startled after hearing a loud noise.<p>

"What was that? Sounded like someone screaming. …Scared the living daylights out of me…"

He continued to walk along his path until he got to a door. Slowly, he creaked it open to see if anyone was in there. It was as barren as a battlefield. He went in and took a look around. It was some kind of grand dining room, with a very long table in the center of the room. Some food was sparse on the table, suggesting that people had eaten here recently.

"Doesn't seem to be anything interesting here…" he muttered to himself. Then, down on the table, he saw something.

"A book?" He picked it up and looked at the cover of it. It was a large book, close to the size of an encyclopedia. A graphite drawing could be seen on the cover. It was of a red mechanical eye giving off an aurora of evil, clear and vivid in detail.

"I'm beginning to think that I should get…"

"HEY!"

Victor turned away from the book and onto the source of the voice. It was a cloaked man, with his face and other visible features hidden.

"Don't mind me, I'm just…"

"How DARE you invade the clan of the Machine!"

"Oh boy."

The man began to run towards him at an incredibly fast speed, but Victor retaliated quickly.

"MACH PUNCH!"

Victor sidestepped the stranger's attack and threw a quick, but forceful punch in his face. The man flew into the west wall as Victor prepped for another attack.

"FLARE BLI-"

Though, before Victor could land another hit, the man did something completely unexpected.

"RESHIRAM! COME NOW!"

Immediately, the wall behind Victor came crumbling down and debris went flying. Once it cleared, a white angelic dragon could be seen among the wreckage the beast had caused. She roared, but it was not a triumphant cry of might and majesty. It was the sorrow mourn of pain and torture.

Victor knew that something was wrong with the Legend, from her torturous, miserable cries. Her body did not look like that the mighty Reshiram's body should. Several pieces of armor were on her body, almost as if someone has welded them on. Her flawless wings now held weaponry such as enemy-seeking missiles. Her beautiful head and two long strands of fur that hung from it were now concealed by a helmet. Her face… her face said it all. It was a grim, painful, saddened expression. She was aware of what was happening, but she was powerless to stop herself.

She was assimilated.

"FINISH HIM!"

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Whoa, that was one heck of a chapter. I had part of this planned out, but a lot of the chapter just… came to me as I typed it. I worked really hard on this chapter, so if you could please review… thank you.

The title of this chapter 'Feed the Machine' comes from the RED song, which (to me, at least) is about fighting 'the Machine'. 'The Machine' seems to be an allegory for conformity, which I thought was applicable given Reshiram's situation and the 'assimilation technology'. Just search the song on YouTube, it's made of win.


	10. Ave Machina

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 10: Ave Machina (Hail the Machine)

* * *

><p>Typhlosion still continued to stand in awe and horror of the monstrosity depicted on the wall. He was still trying to take it all in.<p>

_"No. No, that can't be me. It can't. But… how many other cyborg Typhlosions are there? Or cyborg Pokémon, period…"_

The… beast of the murals looked strikingly similar to Ty. The beast of the murals had the cybernetic headgear, the pack on the end, his metal claw… heck, they got the details of that claw right down to the circuits.

Looking at the skull he was holding in the mural as well as the flaming stone, he failed to find any significance to it. For the moment, at least.

But… that Infernape's face inside that high-tech helmet… the helmet he held in his right hand… it was horrifying. The Infernape in the mural bared an unfortunate resemblance to Victor, Ty's best friend. What was it supposed to mean? Was this an event that yet to come? An event that the beast in the mural was prophesied to do?

Ty could never do that to his best friend. Could he? Would he? Will he?

He looked at his claw. Again, it was the same as the one shown in the hieroglyphics. It was unnatural. Tears started to form in his eyes again, before he rapidly blinked out.

_"Can't cry." _he said to himself. _"I've done enough of that to float the Ark."_

He turned his attention back to the mural. Still, the resemblance was uncanny. He began to think that this wasn't just a coincidence. He used his claw to scratch out the frail stone depicting him and Victor. The stone was soft and easy to dig into, so he got it out fairly easily.

He now looked at the stone in his hands.

"Nevertheless…" he muttered. "I suppose this could be useful for later."

He stored the stone slab in his pack and turned back around the way he came.

* * *

><p>Initially, it had seemed that my path would lead to nothing. However, at the end, I found a red large door. Being a fancy one, it was decorated up with various pieces of gemstones and jewels. The gems were still bright and gleaming scattered around the old door. It definitely indicated that someone had been here at least somewhat recently.<p>

I _was _curious as to what was on the other side of the door and I wanted to explore. However, I got that sense of fear when you know that you have to be careful, lest you end up dead or something like that. Heh, for once, I actually listened to my own concerns.

Deciding to hear out the side of caution, I pressed my ear against the door to try to distinguish any movement on the other side. Silence. Deathly silence. It was almost too silent, as if someone knew I was coming.

My curiosity now overruling my sense of hesitancy, I decided to enter cautiously into the room.

The room was extraordinarily large, probably about the size of your average high school auditorium. On the walls of the room were red vertically-hanging banners, with… a striking symbol on them. It wasn't an inverted cross, or an upside-down Jewish star, so this cult possibly wasn't explicitly Satanic, as I first assumed. However, a cult that deals with assimilation technology to brainwash Pokémon is without a doubt, evil. EVIL EVIL EVIL.

Back onto the symbol, it wasn't anything of those things. It was like an O, except imagine it broken at one place. Then imagine the edges turned outwards, looking like a horseshoe. What was it? A new Unown symbol? Hebrew? Greek? Yiddish? I'm not knowledgeable on this kind of thing. No matter what language it was, it still held an ominous presence to it.

What was very interesting was in the center of the room. I walked up to it and examined it carefully.

It was a table. A very large perfectly circular marble table, much like something you might see in the Middle Ages. 16 chairs were set equally spaced from each other on the edge of the table.

_"16 chairs… 16 members?"_

Near one of the chairs on the edge of the table was… some strange helmet, to say the least of 'strange'. I picked it up. It was blue, with Tron lines much like Typhlosion's cybernetics. I looked inside the helmet to see some circuitry… I began to get an uneasy feeling in my stomach about the strange device. On the table were other chunks of metal, similar in color and design to the helmet. It looked like it could be body armor, but definitely not built for the human physique. What was all this stuff for? I knew well that curiosity could kill the Purrloin here, so I decided it would be for the best that I left it alone. I continued to hold the helmet in one of my paws as I examined the room further.

As I continued to hunt the room for anything else of interest, I couldn't ignore the nagging feeling that the helmet and chunks of metal were part of this assimilation technology.

And another… sense, I should say, tugged at my brain… was someone watching me?

Nah, I thought I was just being paranoid.

Finding a large drawer on the right side of the room, I walked over to it and looked inside. The top and middle drawers held nothing of interest aside from robes with that insignia I mentioned earlier on them. The bottom drawer, on the other hand held something VERY fascinating. A blue paper. I stuck my head closer to the open drawer to get a better look at it, leaving myself vulnerable.

The paper was a blueprint. It depicted technology that was similar to the helmet and chunks of metal I had found. The question remained, was this the-

CONK!

"Ohh…"

Then I was knocked unconscious… again.

* * *

><p>Typhlosion came back to the center of the 4-way split. Neither Raikou nor Victor had come back yet.<p>

"Hello?" he called out. "Anyone there? Victor? Raikou? You find anything?"

Silence.

"You guys there? Can you hear me?"

More silence.

"Huh. Guess not."

He looked down the two paths the others had taken.

"Raikou's path or Victor's path… which should I take?" he asked himself. "Or should I just wait here for them? Hmm. Maybe…"

Then he heard a loud crash.

"That came from the path Victor took…" he realized. He ran down the pathway as fast as a Typhlosion could.

* * *

><p>Victor found himself in a difficult situation. He found himself staring at the face of an assimilated Reshiram. How? How could this cult… much less a single individual, harness the power of the magnificent Legendary Vast White Dragon Reshiram? He stood very little chance against a Legendary as powerful as she. But he still had to try. Fire was ineffective against another Fire-Type, so Reshiram began charging up a Dragon Pulse, with blue energy gathering at the center of her mouth.<p>

Victor had to think quickly.

_"What works against a Dragon / Fire type? Water? No, an Infernape can't learn water moves plus she isn't weak to it. …Got it!"_

Victor lifted his fists, and then pounded them into the ground, causing the floor to violently shake. The earth rumbled and knocked Reshiram off of her feet. The cloaked man continued to watch the battle unravel. Behind his back, he held a remote which controlled the assimilated Reshiram. He turned a 'PAIN' setting to 'Moderate', in an effort to get Reshiram going.

The shock caused to Reshiram's brain was painful, but motivated her to push further to make the pain stop. She could spare no mercy.

With regret, she launched a different move at Victor. It was the most powerful move in her arsenal, Blue Flare. One of the most intense Fire-type moves, you would still think that it'd be ineffective against another Fire-type, right? Wrong.

The intense, yet beautiful Blue Flare engulfed Victor. Normally, a Fire-type Pokémon isn't hurt very much by another Fire-type move, but Blue Flare was an exception, subduing him to painful, scorching burns.

The cloaked man turned the 'PAIN' setting back to 'Off', his will done.

Victor screamed.

Typhlosion ran faster and faster down Victor's path, having heard his cries of torture. His vision was blurring and the door seemed to be too far, but it gradually grew closer and closer and closer until…

POW!

"Victor!" Typhlosion screamed. He saw Victor surrounded by a single, large blue flame, rolling around on the floor desperately trying to remove the painful flame.

"Wait… Prophesized One? The Legendary One spoken of in our legends?" the cloaked man uttered.

Typhlosion didn't hear that. He only heard the tortured screams of his friend. He ran over quickly to him, swiftly trying to put out the fire.

There was a little problem with that.

He had NO water moves.

Now frantic, he dashed over to the table, hunting madly for ANY liquid that could douse the fire. Nothing… nothing… nothing… NOTHING! The screams of Victor became even louder. Growing even more frantic, he grabbed the nearest cloth he saw and covered it over Victor, quickly rolling him around in it. With Blue Flare becoming oxygen-starved, it died down, much to the relief of Typhlosion and Victor.

Victor breathed heavily, trying to recover from the searing pain of the flare. His breathing began to slow down to a normal pace, to a regular level where Victor could a word out of his mouth.

"C-Cyber? T-Typhlosion?"

"Oh, thank God. You're OK." Typhlosion sighed. He unwrapped Victor from the red cloth he had hastily grabbed and let him out. Victor had several burns on him, around second-degree. Fortunately, being a Fire-type makes burns slightly less painful. But only slightly. Still, it didn't require an immediate trip to the Pokémon Center.

"Once we get back to headquarters, we'll apply a Burn Heal."

"OK… thanks Ty. You really saved my ass. But… what about…" Victor stuttered.

Ty looked behind him. Behind him was… a bald white man lacking his robe… and anything else… embarrassingly covering his privates.

"Oh dear Lord, he's naked." he muttered as he turned back around.

"Umm… Prophesized One? M-May I have my robe back?"

"Take it. Take it." he told him as he tossed the burnt robe back to the bald man.

"Bless you, Prophesized One." he told Ty as he ran off with the robe, presumably to get changed. He also quickly recalled Reshiram.

"Uhh… I'm out of the loop." Victor stated. "Are you supposed to be a… Chosen One or something like that?"

"Unfortunately, I think I am…"

* * *

><p>"So… new neophyte, have you truly found the Prophesized One spoke of in our Legends?"<p>

"Yes, Lord Xaphan. You will be very pleased." the black-haired newcomer nodded.

"We'll see."

The man came back in just a few minutes with his freshly roasted robe on, this time having some other members in non-charred red robes with him. Typhlosion and Victor turned to face them, still on the ground. One of the members, having a robe that was a shade of maroon instead of red took off his hood, revealing a head of no hair. What lay in front of his eyes was a cybernetic Typhlosion. His mouth was open in awe.

"The cyborg Typhlosion spoken of in our legends… the one who will deliver us the world… the Cyber Creator. He has come."

The maroon-clothed man walked up to Typhlosion, plunged himself to the ground on his knees and bowed.

"Why is he bowing before you?" Victor asked.

"I think I have an idea…" Typhlosion muttered.

The rest of the group followed the black-haired man and also proceeded to bow before him.

"Well… this is weird." Ty stated.

"You know you could use this to your advantage." Victor informed him.

"But I don't want these people… crazy people, but people… thinking that I'm supposed to be their Messiah."

"But you are." said one of the red cloaked men.

"Hush." the leader whispered. "The Cyber Creator did not give you permission to speak."

Typhlosion sighed. "Come on, you people. Get up. Please stop bowing. Please."

The group of cultists then stood back up. "Does thou have any other wishes?"

Typhlosion did have a question that he wanted an answer to.

"Why am I, the 'Chosen One', so important to you?"

"Do you not know? Well, allow me to explain the prophecy to you. Our legends have foretold for many years here in the Ruins of Alph that we would someday, have our Messiah, the Cyber Creator come in the form of a Typhlosion of great power and help turn the world into his obedient cyborgs. You are he."

Victor's eyes widened nervously on hearing that. To clear a point, he mentioned, "Uhh, just for the record, that prophecy doesn't include ME, does it?"

Xaphan spoke up. "Legend also holds that he will have his own second-in-command loyal to him, in the form of an Infernape."

Victor and Typhlosion seemed notably alarmed; however, Victor later shrugged it off thinking that they probably had the wrong guys. 'Ty would never do that.' he thought.

On the other hand, Typhlosion had his own set of doubts. _"Turn the world into obedient cyborgs?"_ He knew the emotional conflicts of being one, and turning the entire Pokémon World into his obedient slaves was certainly not something he had on his agenda for the day…

"So… what now?" Ty asked.

"Let us treat you to a formal dinner."

"Dinner? What time is it anyways?"

Typhlosion pressed a button on his pack and let a visor emerge and covered his eyes, giving him a detailed computer screen. The cultists awed in wonder while Victor rolled his eyes at their easily impressionable nature.

"Wow. 6:30 already. My, how time flies." He then took his visor off by hand and stored it back into his backpack.

The cultists were still in awe as Typhlosion stared at them blankly.

"…What?"

The cultists applauded (much to Ty's confusion and Victor's annoyance) and proceeded to walk him and Victor to the main conference room, also where the cultists dined at night. They all began to walk down the hallway Victor had come down.

The question still remained for Typhlosion, though… Was he or was he not the 'Chosen One' of whatever strange religion these cultists belonged to? He was honestly hoping he wasn't… He didn't want to be the Messiah of a cult that uses assimilation technology to brainwash Pokémon. The stone slab he had cut off earlier remained in his pack and while Typhlosion did not know it, the events on that stone would try to come to fruition, though it would not start with Victor…

* * *

><p>"*groan* My head… I feel like someone DoubleSlapped me over and over. Where am I? Why is it so dark? And… why can't I move?"<p>

I couldn't move. My four feet were restrained onto a surface of some sort. Two of my front feet felt to be at about the position where human arms would be on a chair, with my two back feet clamped to a cold object. Guessing from the way my body was positioned, I deduced that I was in a chair of sorts. A cold FREEZING chair. But I still had no clue where the heck I was…

A light came on. The white light was harsh and unexpected, so it blinded me briefly. Finally, my eyes adjusted to the light level and I could see where I was. It was a large, cold, sterile room with various machines spread about. My suspicions were that this was a laboratory of sorts. Looking down, I saw wearing a red suit with that strange symbol on it, and I indeed strapped to a chair. They… wouldn't actually try to be stupid enough to use the electric chair on an Electric-type, are they? 'Cause that would be funny.

"So, you're conscious." came a voice.

"Huh?" I asked, looking around. "Who's there?"

Across from where I was, there was a hallway entrance. A man in a red robe walked in.

"My name is Simon and I'm so glad you could join me, Raikou."

"All right, whatever you're up to, it isn't funny! Now let me out of here!"

"But that would mess with my master's plans. This was his direct orders when I found you."

"His direct orders?" I hesitated to ask further, but I did. "Those orders would be…"

Simon smirked. "You see, Raikou…" he began. "This is a very special cult."

"If by special, you mean completely screwed up…" I grumbled under my breath.

"This cult serves one purpose and one purpose only. To serve our Messiah, the Cyber Creator. The one who will hand us the world and make everyone our obedient cyborgs."

I was speechless. I wasn't sure to say. "Dude…" I began. "You are completely messed up in the head. I think you should seek professional help."

"Oh, I won't be the one needing help…" the cultist grinned sadistically. "YOU will."

"…"

"…"

"… So, what are you going to do?"

"Argh! I'm brainwashing you, you idiot!"

"Oh, that's not good." I realized.

Simon walked over to a control panel next to me. "Starting today, and for the rest of your life, you will be a slave to the Cyber Creator!"

On the control panel, I couldn't see what he was inputting. But I do know that once he stepped away from the control panel, and walked outside… bad things began to happen.

Something… a helmet, slowly descended onto my head. As I saw the circuitry inside, I realized that this was the same helmet I saw earlier in that conference room. I felt pieces of something… I couldn't see what, attach to my body. I think it was that armor I saw earlier. A tube through the helmet ran up to my mouth and wormed its' way inside. Gases came out and my nervous system began to slow down, so I couldn't fight back. I gulped, really beginning to get scared. I couldn't see anything else through the helmet except a glass panel. I heard a voice come through… speakers on my helmet.

"Hello Raikou. How are you today?" came the sound of a gentle male voice. "Welcome to the Cult of the Machine. Rewriting memory…"

"No... NO!" I screamed frantically in sheer horror, realizing the gravity of the situation. "Stop! No! Please! Uhh... AAAAAAHHHHHH!"

* * *

><p>The cultists, as well as Typhlosion and Victor all arrived in the main room relatively quickly and 14 of the 16 cultists sat themselves in their pre-designated chairs. The leader, Lord Xaphan, instead offered his much grander chair to Typhlosion.<p>

"W-Well thanks, but I mean, you don't real-"

"It is an honor to vacate my throne in honor of you, Cyber Creator."

"Umm… OK then. I'll go along." Typhlosion found himself surprisingly comfortable in the marble chair, not expecting marble to feel so nice. Lord Xaphan sat down in the empty seat to the right of Typhlosion.

"And me?" asked Victor.

"You get to stand up."

"You don't have any more chairs?"

"Wal-Mart's refused to sell us anything after the flaming birthday cake incident." Xaphan grumbled.

"The flaming birth-"

"I don't really want to know." interrupted Typhlosion.

"And let's keep it that way. Monkey, you are standing."

"And all of this coming from the man who tried to burn me alive…"

"No, that was Mike. The one in the charred robe."

Victor looked across the table to see a man, bald and with a black charred robe. Mike waved.

"Oh yeah… thanks a lot for almost killing me, you moron!"

In not much longer than 10 minutes, various kinds of foods make their way to the circular marble table. Beef, prime rib, steak, every fruit imaginable, pasta, fancy salads, spinach, celery, asparagus, peas, carrots, tomatoes, cucumbers and even brussel sprouts.

Victor eyed the brussel sprouts oddly. "Brussel sprouts? Who even LIKES brussel sprouts?"

Xaphan pointed to the guy left of Typhlosion.

"…Dave."

Dave simply smiled and waved back.

"Well… good for Dave." Typhlosion muttered. "Anyway, let's dig in."

"Yes, Chosen One." all of the cultists spoke in unison.

"I'm never going to get used to that…" Typhlosion sighed.

What Typhlosion and Victor never seemed to notice was the absence of one the cult's members…

* * *

><p>"Assimilation 55% complete…"<p>

I screamed, though my voice was muffled through the gases began injected in my mouth. I felt the immense pain of having cyber armor screwed into my body and I had to endure the mental pain of my memory being rewritten.

"No... no... please, make it stop..."

I… I didn't want to belong to this cult. I didn't want to obey the Cyber Creator. I-I… I wanted to go home. Be with Entei and Suicune. I began to tear… I-I love you guys so much…

* * *

><p>Victor quickly indulged himself in the prime rib, not having a care in the world. Typhlosion tried to eat something, but he couldn't. Something seemed… wrong.<p>

"Hey, uh… Xaphan."

"Yes, Chosen One?" Xaphan turned towards him.

"Umm… th-the reason I'm here… well… I need that assimilation technology…" Typhlosion slowly muttered. Silently, he added in the back of his head, _"Though, I don't really WANT it…"_

"That is no problem." Xaphan nodded. Xaphan excused himself from the table and walked over to a large drawer on the right side of the room. He opened the bottom drawer and pulled out a sheet of blueprints. He handed it to Typhlosion.

"Umm, thanks."

Xaphan excused himself again to walk to another door in the corner of this grand conference room. He pulled out several pieces of armor and a helmet, setting it on Typhlosion's lap.

"Thank you. I didn't expect this to be so easy. Now we can get going. Victor?"

"But this is prime rib!"

"…"

"…Fine."

"Wait." Typhlosion said. "Where's Raikou?"

* * *

><p>"Assimilation 80% complete…"<p>

It was hopeless at this point, to fight back, to try… to do anything. The memories of Entei and Suicune were fading away from my consciousness. I slowly muttered to myself in a twisted robotic voice,

"MuSt… ObEy… tHe MaChiNe…"

* * *

><p>"Raikou?" Xaphan said. "You're looking for him?"<p>

"Yes, have you seen him?"

"He is in the Assimilation Room going under conversion for you, Cyber Creator."

"Thanks, I'll just… wait… WHAT?"

"Soon, he will be your slave. No need to thank us, it is our pleas-"

CRASH!

Xaphan turned to see a destroyed wall next to him. Typhlosion and Victor were both gone.

"Well, they could have just taken the door…" Xaphan muttered.

* * *

><p>"Assimilation 90% complete…"<p>

Raikou had lost all sense of his self-being at this point. All memories of Entei and Suicune had been erased. All traces of individuality were gone. His mind was no longer his own...

"My MaSTeR... iS tHe CyBeR CreAToR... I wIlL ObEy MaSteR..."

* * *

><p>"These people are CRAZY!" Typhlosion yelled in anger to his friend while running quickly through the hallways. "We need to find Raikou, ASAP!"<p>

"The Ruins of Alph are HUGE. How are we going to find Raikou?"

The duo briefly remained quiet and a sound could be heard in the distance. It sounded like robotic screams of torture.

"We'd better get to him, quick."

* * *

><p>"Assimilation 95% complete…"<p>

"Uhh..." Finally, Raikou slipped into unconsciousness from the violent brainwashing.

The duo closed in on Raikou. They made their way through the halls and after countless zigzagging through the maze-like Ruins, they found where Raikou was.

"Assimilation 99% complete…"

"Get that thing off!" Typhlosion grabbed the machine and cuffs restraining Raikou and crushed it, freeing him. Quickly, they hauled Raikou's unconscious body onto the ground of the laboratory. Victor checked his pulse.

"He's still alive. Can you get the armor off?"

Typhlosion tried to use his metal claw to rip off the armor, but to no avail.

"It's screwed into his flesh and already burnt into his skin." he said. "I can't rip it off."

"Oh no…" muttered Victor.

"We… We need to get out of this hell-hole." Typhlosion gulped.

"You… still have the blueprints?"

"Yes." Typhlosion nodded. "That should be enough to satisfy Team Rocket."

"…Then let's go."

* * *

><p>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak

OK… absolutely darkest chapter I've done so far. Just sayin'.

A/N: Starting with next chapter, I'm stopping Raikou's First-Person POV. It's getting too hard to maintain that and Third-Person, and I find myself in a difficult position. The rest of the story will only be told in Third-Person. The previous chapters (and this one) will remain unaffected, though.

Oh, and don't forget to review!


	11. Resist the Machine

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 11: Resist the Machine

* * *

><p>Typhlosion and Victor ran from the Ruins of Alph as fast as possible, with the unconscious Raikou held by Ty. Fortunately, they made it out of the Ruins without catching the crazy cult's attention. Once they were hidden by the forests surrounding the Ruins, Ty and Victor stopped to collect their breath.<p>

"Whoa." sighed Victor. "Glad we got out of that crazy place. And we got the plans."

"Yeah…" muttered Typhlosion. "But what do we do about Raikou?"

Typhlosion set Raikou down onto the ground and laid his unconscious body against a tree, leaving him shaded. His high-tech helmet and cyber armor were still grafted on him, unable to be removed.

"…I don't know."

"Maybe we should see about waking Raikou up."

Typhlosion walked to Raikou and gently shook his body. "Raikou? Come on, wake up."

Typhlosion didn't get a lot of response from Raikou; with him keeping still almost as if he was… deactivated. That or dead.

"Raikou… come on, PLEASE wake up." Typhlosion silently begged. "Wake up, get up, activate, whatever."

Upon the activate command, Raikou seemed to come into consciousness. Typhlosion stood back and let Raikou have some room. Raikou's limbs moved and supported his body up into a standing position.

Typhlosion sighed in relief. "You're OK. Thank goodness."

"We had better get going back to headquarters." noted Victor. Typhlosion nodded and began to walk off with Victor… and with Raikou staying behind, still as a stone. It didn't go unnoticed by the two Fire starters and walked back the few yards they had briefly traveled.

Victor and Typhlosion looked at Raikou. "Raikou? I say we need to get to headquarters."

"…"

"Raikou?" Victor asked again.

"…AwAiTiNg FuRtHeR OrDeRs FroM MaSTeR." Raikou recited with his new robotic voice.

"Uhh… what's with Raikou's… strange voice?" Victor wondered.

Typhlosion sighed. "I wonder… if this is the result from that brainwashing… Raikou, are you OK?" Typhlosion asked with hesitance.

"I aM FiNe, MaSTeR. I AwAiT FuRtHeR CoMManD."

The voice sent chills down Typhlosion's spine. That cold, robotic and soulless voice…

_"No…" _he thought. _"It… it can't be…" _He immediately had to eat those words upon remembering that Raikou was brainwashed… to obey his command. Guilt poured over Typhlosion over this realization… he now controlled the life of another being. Brainwashing someone was a sick, sadistic thing for anyone to do to someone, but Ty never expected this.

"I… I feel sick." Typhlosion whispered.

"ArE yOu oK, MaSTeR? Is tHeRe sOMethInG I cAn Do?"

Typhlosion groaned again, feeling only more nauseous on hearing Raikou call him 'Master'. _"Raikou's gone." _he realized. _"All that's left is… a machine that obeys my every order. A… a slave."_

"Excuse me for a moment." he told Raikou and Victor. Victor, understanding the guilt Typhlosion felt, gave him his space and let him go off a bit into the distance.

"Is MaSTeR OK?" asked Raikou. "I… I oNLy WiSh To PlEAsE HiM."

Victor sighed. Neither Typhlosion nor Victor nor Raikou himself saw this event coming. Raikou was now an obedient slave to Typhlosion, with the Johto Fire starter wanting none of it.

"He… just needs some space right now. OK, Raikou?"

"…YeS."

Vomiting sounds could be heard from where Typhlosion was. It seemed to continue for around 5 to 10 minutes, with the sounds being unpleasant to Victor's ears. Raikou thought nothing of it, and only waited for his 'Master' to return. After a little while, Typhlosion came back with some vomit still on his mouth and his face red.

Victor hesitantly muttered, "You… uhh… still have some… vomit there." Typhlosion wiped the rest of his mouth with his arm back onto his metal parts. Metal… every time he saw that metal on his skin, it reminded him that he was a cyborg, something he couldn't change. Unfortunately, Raikou now seemed destined to share the same fate…

He began to feel nauseous again, but held it back this time. He muttered to Victor and Raikou, "We need to get going."

"All right."

"YeS, MaSTeR."

Typhlosion made no other sound other than the audible pat of footsteps away from the Ruins of Alph. Victor and Raikou followed after.

* * *

><p>The trio made their way back to Mahogany Town, where the Team Rocket HQ was located. They found themselves hidden in the trees, lurking near the entrance to Route 43.<p>

"I kinda wish Team Rocket had a more… easily accessible entrance." Victor found himself griping.

"Knock off it, Vic. I'd love it too, but let's face it. Team Rocket's not going make the entrance THAT obvious. It'd be like making a secret clubhouse with flashing neon lights that say 'Secret Clubhouse'. It defeats the purpose."

"…Entrance is over here." Victor grumbled. He lifted up a stone and set it to the side. Underneath was a neat marble stairway leading to the underground Team Rocket HQ.

You see (oh great, I just broke the fourth wall), when Team Rocket was busted 8 years ago, they eventually reunited. After the heat of the initial scandal died down, the Mahogany Town Souvenir Shop shut down and the primary entrance there was sealed off with concrete. However, due to the somewhat stupid nature of the police in the Pokémon World, Team Rocket was very easily able to create an alternate route to the still standing lab.

The trio made their way down the stairway heading straight to Giovanni's office with the blueprints, with Raikou still following faithful at his 'master's' heels. The close proximity made Typhlosion uncomfortable, to say the least.

"Could you… uh, back up a little bit Raikou? You're kinda close."

"Of CoUrSe, MaSTeR." Raikou spaced himself a good 5 to 10 feet away from his master to satisfy him.

"Victor, what do I do about Raikou? I mean… I don't want him like this… to serve me. It's just… not right."

Typhlosion looked back to Raikou. His eyes, barely visible under his cover of his helmet seemed… spaced-out, drowsy, and almost trance-like, as if he was stuck in a hypnotic state. The fiery red in his eyes was diminished into a barely flickering flame. Even though he knew it technically wasn't his fault, Typhlosion couldn't help but let the guilt consume his heart.

"I don't know, Ty. I don't know anything about that technology they used. I guess I'm just thankful it wasn't ME being brainwashed. What CAN you do?"

Typhlosion sighed. "Raikou still has a family he needs to find, and he's not gonna find it if he's brainwashed. The only thing to do is find a way to reverse it."

Victor stopped for a moment, at first comprehending what Typhlosion implied. "You mean you're going to help him break out of here? But we already tried that…"

"At some point." he confirmed. "I've had a bit more than I can handle of Team Rocket; 8 years get to you. But right now, we need to just focus on finding a way to reverse this. Hand me the blueprints for a second, will ya?"

Victor did so. "What do you want with them?"

"Before we give these to Giovanni, I'm gonna take a digital scan of these. Chances are we aren't going to get those blueprints back, and they might be useful later."

Holding the blueprints directly in front of him, he again activated the goggles that emerged from his pack and began to scan them. Blue lights emerged from his eyes and steadily moved up and down the blueprints. Eventually, the blue lights flickered off and they retracted themselves into his pack.

"Got them." he said. "Now we should get these blueprints to Giovanni before things go downhill."

Eventually, the trio finally came to Giovanni's office.

"Hmm, what do we do?" muttered Victor. "Lights are on and I think I hear him talking to someone."

"Just slip the blueprints under his door. That should be good enough." Victor nodded and quickly and quietly slipped the blueprints under the office door. The two Fire Starters then quickly ran into the distance, with Raikou's now cybernetic brain taking its' time processing the movement and action, and he then promptly followed them.

The trio now found themselves walking to Victor's storage room, the same one Raikou had. They began to talk about their situation with the brainwashed Raikou.

"What DO we do?" muttered Victor, finally grasping on the gravity of the situation. "We should've gotten there sooner…"

"Is tHeRe a PrObLEm, MaSTeR?" asked Raikou with his haunting robotic voice. Typhlosion began to think about it for a while, and then spoke again.

"Victor?" he asked.

"Yeah?"

"Could you get Zekrom if he's here? I want him to take a good look at Raikou. I'll take Raikou back to my room."

"All right." Victor walked off in the opposite direction while Typhlosion and Raikou continued to go forward.

"MaSTeR?" wondered Raikou. "WhY…?"

"Raikou, I'm not your master." he told him. "No one is."

Raikou paused for a moment to consider this. He rebutted, "RiDiCuLOuS. I WiSh tO SeRVe YoU FrOm My oWn WiLL."

"No, you don't Raikou. They… programmed you to say that."

"…PrOgRaMMeD?" Raikou began to think about it for a second. "No." he decided. "I Am nOt ProgRaMMeD iN aNy Way."

Typhlosion sighed as they continued to walk toward his room, its' location memorized to heart at this point. After a bit of navigating around the corridors, the duo reached the room. Typing in a combination on the keypad, he and Raikou stepped inside. They made their way to Typhlosion's bed, with the various charging wires scattered about. Both now-cyborgs sat on the right side of the bed, facing the left wall and a strange plethora of other machines.

The silence was an awkward one, leaving Typhlosion shifting a bit uncomfortably. Raikou remained quiet and diligent, waiting for an order. Typhlosion scratched the back of his head and closed his eyes, setting a small mental barrier between himself and reality. It was interrupted quickly, however, by none other than Raikou.

"MaSTeR?"

Typhlosion's final straw seemed to be pulled with that word, delivered in a soulless manner.

"RAIKOU! STOP… JUST STOP CALLING ME THAT!" he yelled in frustration, his voice just barely hanging onto the edge of sanity.

That had caught Raikou by complete surprise. He was left hurt and confused, unaware of anything he had done to upset his master. "…DiD… DiD I dO sOmeTHinG WrOnG?"

After Typhlosion's initial eruption, he regathered his senses and began (or at least tried to) speak softly.

"No." he said with a voice of regret. "I just… don't want you to call me 'master'."

"…WhY?"

"Raikou… I don't want to have dominion over you. I don't want to be your… master." Typhlosion told the tiger truthfully.

"…ThEn WhAt ShaLL I CaLL YoU?"

"How about calling me Typhlosion, for starters?" he smiled. "It's my name after all."

Raikou smiled from underneath the exterior of the helmet. "YeS, MaS... TyPHlosIOn."

* * *

><p>"So, Raikou's been brainwashed and turned into a cyborg. By an insane religious machine cult?"<p>

"…To put it simply, yes."

Victor and Zekrom were walking down the corridors to Typhlosion's room, with Zekrom holding a large piece of equipment in his arms. Victor had already told Zekrom everything that had happened to them and Raikou in the Ruins of Alph… minus one detail. Victor still wondered if he should confess to Zekrom that his former fiancée was also brainwashed and assimilated into said cult. If he did tell Zekrom, then at least he would know… but then Zekrom would have to deal with the horror of having his loved one brainwashed. If he didn't… well, Zekrom would still believe that Reshiram is home in Unova perfectly fine, waiting for the day he will return.

Victor decided against it.

* * *

><p>Victor had let himself and Zekrom into the room.<p>

"Oh good, you guys are here." Typhlosion sighed in relief. "What's that thing you're carrying in your arms, Zekrom?"

"It's a brainwave scanner." he told him. "It can't reverse the process but with it, I think we should be able to figure out what Raikou is thinking and how his brain has been altered."

Typhlosion had some of his spirits lifted on hearing Zekrom's words. Even if it can't break the brainwashing, getting an insight on Raikou's altered brain structure HAD to shed some new light on the subject… right?

Typhlosion leapt off of his bed while Raikou remained in place. Zekrom set the large chunk of equipment next to Raikou, turning dials and getting it booted up.

"WhAt IS ThaT… EqUIpMeNt, MaS… TyPhLosIOn?"

Zekrom nodded his head, acknowledging Raikou's question. "Allow me to explain in better detail. I'm… good with inventions and this is one I came up with that could help you. It's a brainwave scanner, able to detect brainwave signatures and differences in them over periods of time. Originally, I used it for Dream World analysis back in Unova, but I think my invention can shed some light on how that Cult's brainwashing affected you."

"…I sUppOSe."

"But you'll need to be asleep for it to work."

"FaiR EnOUgH." Raikou made himself comfortable in the bed, closing his eyes and bringing the blanket over his body. You could hear the mechanical parts of him shutting down slowly until he was not in an asleep state, but an unconscious one.

Typhlosion bent closer down to Raikou to examine him. His heart pulse was slower, as if he was asleep, but Raikou lacked any rhythmic breathing. Though, this wasn't the time to be worrying about that kind of thing.

Zekrom placed some electrical nodes around Raikou's body; some on his stomach, some of them around his paws. Most of them were attached to Raikou's helmet. Zekrom moved over to a chair to sit down on it, with the scanner in his lap. After messing with a few more settings on the scanner, Zekrom pressed a button on the side of the scanner. Raikou's body was jolted a bit after the machine was turned on.

"That's normal, right?" Victor asked, a bit concerned.

"Yes, most beings, humans and Pokémon experience that. It's really not that painful. I would know; I tested it out myself."

Victor shrugged his shoulders. "If you say so…"

Zekrom, Victor, and Typhlosion all began to look at the screen on the scanner. Victor and Typhlosion couldn't make heads or tails of the wavy line fluctuating up and down. They had no clue but the line spoke a clear language for Zekrom. On the side of the scanner, results of Raikou's brainwave scanning were printing out. After a while, Zekrom took the paper and began to analyze it.

"Hmm. There was a lot of activity in his brainwaves that happened a few hours ago, no doubt his brainwashing. But his brainwaves now are much more… restricted and tight. No regular being has brainwaves this tight, no one I've met does."

Typhlosion and Victor stood there with an 'I have no clue what the hell you're talking about' expression on their faces. "And his brainwaves being restricted means… what?" inquired Typhlosion.

Zekrom rolled his eyes. "I'll put it in English for you. It means that the brainwashing was very harsh, very brutal and very forceful. As in 'It is now in my DNA to obey and serve your every will' level."

"So, are you saying there's no way to reverse it?" feared Typhlosion.

"Well… not quite. Do you have any plans for that machine?"

"Actually yes. I stored a digital copy of its' blueprints in case it would prove useful later. I'll print out a copy." Typhlosion walked up to the already activated computer in the distance and plugged his USB port into it. After choosing his printing options and whether to use pink, yellow, blue, black ink or put flowers on it, the plans came out of the computer's printer. Zekrom snatched them up.

He scrutinized the blueprints and took in its' information. "I need to know something. Did you or did you not get Raikou out of that machine before it reached a 100% brainwashing?"

Typhlosion and Victor began to search their memories to recall the events of the Ruins of Alph.

"Well…" Typhlosion began. "We were able to rip him out of there, but I think the brainwashing must've gotten pretty far, seeing as how he's at my every whim. That voice that came out of the machine… how far did it say Victor?"

"I believe it said was like, 99% percent complete."

Zekrom smiled. "If that's the case, then you two still have a shot to break it. The technology Raikou has on him is incredibly advanced. Even being an inventor, I haven't seen anything like it. But this technology has something unique about it. If a brainwashing is 100% complete, a lock has its' chance to insert itself in the brain."

"A lock?"

Zekrom nodded. "This lock is what makes the brainwashing permanent and irreversible. Once 100% is complete, the brainwash is finished by adding a lock with no known way to unlock it. So you guys still have a chance to snap Raikou out of it. After you do that, maybe we'll figure out a way to remove that armor as well. You saved him in the nick of time."

"That's good." Typhlosion sighed in relief.

Dark clouds of thought still made their way into Victor's mind as he remembered Reshiram, with all of that armor fused onto her. If what Zekrom said was true then Reshiram probably went through a 100% brainwashing, unlike Raikou.

"Wait." Victor muttered. "So Zekrom, what you're saying is… that if the brainwash is fully 100% complete… then it can't be reversed?"

"To my knowledge, there's no way to reverse it once the lock is activated. But that's not an issue, you got Raikou out in time, and that's what matters. Just remind him of and reinforce his memories, and the brainwashing should gradually wear down. I don't know how long it could take, though."

Victor struggled with his conscience. Now more than ever, he felt the need to tell Zekrom about Reshiram. But at the same time, how do you break the heart of a 'Mon and tell him that his love is, as it turns out, **permanently** brainwashed? Typhlosion, on the other hand, seemed to have forgotten about the encounter with Reshiram, most likely because he was too panicked to save Victor from burning to death to notice a 10 foot tall dragon.

"If that's all you need, I'll take my leave."

"Thanks again." said a grateful Typhlosion.

"No problem." Zekrom took his equipment and left the room, leaving Victor and Typhlosion alone with the unconscious Raikou.

Typhlosion looked over to Victor. "How about we get you that Burn Heal now?"

"…I'm fine, thanks."

"Hey Raikou." said Typhlosion. "It's fine, you can wake up now."

Raikou's cybernetic machinery began to whir to life again, as the new cyborg got up from the bed and walked up to Typhlosion.

"ThANk YoU, Ma- TyPHlosIoN."

Typhlosion faced the cyberized Raikou. "Hey listen, you don't have to take my orders. You should do what you want."

"…NoT TaKE oRDerS? I… cAN nOT iMaGiNe tHe ThOuGhT. I… WaNT To SeRVe YoU."

Typhlosion chuckled, with the happier side of his personality coming back. "Then we'll need to work on that, won't we? You HAVE a life; you just need to remember it."

"YeS."

"For right now, it's getting pretty late." Typhlosion, close to the computer, went ahead and looked at its' time instead of bothering to pull out his own digital clock.

"11:00. Were we seriously up THAT late?"

Victor smiled softly. "There simply aren't enough hours in the day, aren't there? I'll leave you two alone." With that, Victor departed.

"Yeah. Come on Raikou, let's get to sleep."

Almost instantly, Raikou's circuits prepared themselves for an unconscious state. He laid down on the floor and switched to STANDBY mode. His breathing slowed and Raikou became… very peaceful.

"But…" Typhlosion tried to protest. "You don't have to sleep on the… never mind, you're already asleep." Typhlosion snuggled into his bed and attached the charging wires onto him. It took several years to get used to having to attach WIRES on his body whenever he went to sleep, but it finally became normal for him. He closed his eyes and drifted off to dreamland, muttering to himself.

"It'll be OK, Raikou… Yeah, it'll be fine…"

* * *

><p>Zekrom had come back to his Pokéball and was walking throughout his simulation, a standard river with various berries and plant life, pacing all the while. It was another one of those sleepless nights for him. It was the kind of night when his thoughts drifted to Reshiram.<p>

He walked over to a nearby tree and picked up an item lying on its' bark. It was a photograph, the one taken of Reshiram a week before their wedding was supposed to take place. The memories were painful for Zekrom to recollect. He didn't really know what to do anymore. Was Reshiram still in Unova, waiting for the day Zekrom would return? Or… did something… worse happen to her?

_"No." _he decided. _"I need to believe. I need to have faith that she's OK. It's… hard to do when faith doesn't have scientific fact behind it… but it's all I have now."_

Zekrom sat down on the ground, pulling his way too small blanket over him as he tried to go to sleep.

_"Faith is all I have now…"_

* * *

><p>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak

A/N: Again, I enjoyed writing this chapter, and I put a lot of thought of where I wanted the direction to go.

A bit of trivia: Chapters 9-11 all take their titles around themes revolved around RED's Feed the Machine, struggling with identity and conformity.

Also, next chapter will (finally) feature Entei and his side of the story. Again, please review, and constructive criticism (don't worry, I take it very well) is very much appreciated!


	12. The Great Escape

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 12: The Great Escape

* * *

><p><em>Earlier that day, on Route 16…<em>

"Kill me." he said. "Kill me now! Just send a Hyper Beam down from heaven and kill me now!"

"Oh, stop being so melodramatic, Entei."

Entei sighed to himself as he continued training with Eusine, as the caped man held two Pokéballs in his hands. It's not like he wanted to, but it's not like he had a choice in the matter, either. Whether Entei liked it or not, Eusine was now legally his master and he had to follow HIS orders.

It's not the concept of obeying orders or having a master that frightened Entei. After all, he had been obedient of his mother's orders to guard the Johto region. In fact, having orders given to him and having someone in charge of him usually kept him on-task and organized. No, what truly scared Entei was obeying someone who didn't truly care about him. Someone who only saw him as an object to be used then discarded like yesterday's trash.

This was the exact situation that he found himself trapped with Eusine.

Eusine ordered a command from his Alakazam to continue the training.

"Alakazam, use Psywave!"

Alakazam closed his eyes and began to focus. A wavy rainbow-colored beam began to quickly progress towards Entei. He skillfully dodged it and threw a Flamethrower back his way.

Entei felt slightly guilty for having to scorch Alakazam, even if it was just part of training. Entei may have hated Eusine, but he viewed his Alakazam more like as an ally. Most Pokémon tend to have the same views as their trainers, but Alakazam openly objected to keeping Entei as ransom for Suicune.

Entei smiled softly, remembering Alakazam being so understanding of his situation. He just wished Eusine had seen it the same way…

"At least someone here is on my side." he thought to himself.

"And… that should be enough battling for the moment!" he announced, stopping Entei's and Alakazam's sparring.

"You did a great job, Alakazam." he congratulated his psychic friend.

"Ala…" he muttered softly, unsure what to think of his trainer now. He and Eusine had always been friends, ever since Alakazam was a little Abra. Sure, Eusine was a little eccentric about Suicune, but that was Eusine for you. Over the years, however, Eusine became more and more obsessed over Suicune, as the beautiful Beast continued to elude him. His obsession started to grow to an unhealthy level, concerning Alakazam. Eusine's obsession hadn't become horrific yet, but the possibility was still available. But Alakazam knew Eusine finally crossed the line by deciding to keep Entei as ransom for Suicune. There didn't seem to be much hope left for Eusine if he was willing to go above his sense of ethics to obtain Suicune.

"You did a great job too, Entei." the Mystery Man told him.

Entei slowly looked his way and growled at him menacingly.

_"How are you able to be so considerate towards me while you hold me captive? You keep me here to lure Suicune here just so you can have her! Yet, you won't let me go just to save my own brother… You took what I valued most."_

Eusine, of course unable to know what Entei was thinking, quickly shrugged his growling off.

"Though… you still have a problem with your plan; that is, your plan for keeping me hostage." Entei verbally said to Eusine.

"Oh Entei, don't think of it as being held hostage. Think of it as an extended stay with a friend."

"…Sure."

"But what would that problem be?"

"How are you even going to let Suicune know you're holding me as a hostage? You caught me by complete accident."

"Catching you was unintentional, I admit, but this'll work out." he 'assured' Entei. "She knows I took you. She knows that, you know that, and I know that. Knowing how elusive Suicune is, I can conclude that he…"

"She." Entei corrected the man.

"Even better." Eusine smirked. "I can conclude that SHE would have to be very clever. After hunting… her for years, I know her well enough."

_"Minus the gender." _the fire Beast snarked in the back of his head.

"She'll figure out where to go. And I'll be right here waiting. Any other questions?"

Alakazam shot Eusine a look of complete hatred, a look that he never previously would've given to him until today. It disappointed Alakazam greatly to see his master stoop to such a low level for Suicune. He remained silent.

Entei looked straight into Eusine's eyes. Blue, he noted. The same shade of blue as Suicune's fur was. Thinking of her and how Eusine was only using him to lure Suicune and make her his own, Entei really only had one thing he could say.

"…I hate you."

"I can live with that." he easily shrugged off. "Come. We're heading back to my house."

Eusine recalled Entei, figuring that Entei should try and learn to adapt to his new home. Until Suicune came, Eusine wouldn't be releasing Entei anytime soon. As the trainer walked off, Alakazam followed, beginning to despise the way his master and friend was treating the Fire Beast.

On the way back, perhaps only a 10-minute walk from Route 16 where Eusine was training, Entei received a few quiet moments to himself. The Pokéball simulation was quiet and peaceful. It was kind of nice to not having to listen to Eusine's orders, allowing his thoughts to flow freely. They began to drift back to his only other single trainer, Ethan.

_"Ethan." _Entei smiled to himself. _"Now there's a guy who knows what's best. A trainer who always put his Pokémon first and never gives up on them. A guy who knew just how to handle me. I miss him. Those years together were quite fun. Still haven't found the same thrill that I get when battling with him. Perhaps someday, I'll find him again."_

_"Entei?"_

Entei looked around him, only to see no one else besides him.

"Who's there?"

_"It's me, Alakazam." _the voice said telepathically.

"Alakazam… why are you here? What do you want to talk about?"

_"…I don't like the way Master's been treating you."_

Entei sighed. "I'm not exactly a big fan of his treatment of me either, Alakazam. What can I do? I'm just trapped here."

_"…You know I really shouldn't be doing this, but…"_

Entei waited a few seconds before Alakazam let his few words slip into the abyss. Deciding to provoke him, Entei asked,

"But what?"

Alakazam sighed. _"…I've decided. I'm going to help you escape. Tonight."_

Entei's smile came back to him again. "Really Alakazam? You'd do that? You'd disobey your trainer to free me?"

_"Normally, I'd never do such a thing… but… you still need to find your brother. You can't do that if you're stuck here, now can you?"_

"…Thank you."

* * *

><p><em>2:00 p.m.<em>

"So, we've been busy training all morning, we've had lunch… what now, guys?" Eusine asked the Fire Beast Entei and his friend Alakazam. The three were in the kitchen, with Eusine questioning what they could all do next.

Alakazam and Entei remained quiet. Neither of them felt like talking to Eusine, after the incident on Route 16.

"Boy, you guys have REALLY been enjoying the quiet game since we got back." he said, oblivious to his own sense of morality. "Hmm. Anyone feel like playing Super Smash Bros. Brawl?"

Alakazam simply nodded and snapped his fingers. Instantly, the Wii in the living room next to them powered on, with the Brawl disc already inside the Wii. The three walked over to the TV, and picked up the Wii Remotes with the Nunchuks attached to them.

Both of the devices felt awkward in Entei's paws. He was actually kind of used to the feel though, since he had played the Wii a few times before when he was owned by Ethan. He remembered that he liked Brawl in particular, having beaten Ethan before a few times. At the very least, this would be a great way to vent out his frustration with Eusine.

Skipping the intro with people singing in freakin' Latin, Eusine went to straight to the Brawl character select screen. All of the characters were already unlocked and all three of the players began to select theirs. Alakazam, being a Psychic-type and fan of using Psychic-type moves in battle, went with Ness. In Melee, he liked to go with both Mewtwo and Ness before the Ultimate Pokémon got kicked out.

That was one heck of a lawsuit Mewtwo threw against HAL Laboratories.

Eusine went with Meta Knight, being a fan over his cape. Entei, despite being a Fire-type, went with Pikachu, someone he had experience playing with. While Eusine was selecting his character, Alakazam quickly set up the team options, pitting Pikachu and Ness vs. Meta Knight. Quickly getting into the fray (and not noticing what Alakazam had done), Eusine chose the random stage option, getting the Spear Pillar stage selected.

Alakazam and Entei smirked. It was no longer a free-for-all, and both Pikachu and Ness were going to team up and put the hurt on Meta Knight.

"Hey wait. Why are your characters the same…? Oh crap."

"GO!" shouted the in-game announcer.

Pikachu and Ness quickly proved that Meta Knight was no match for the duo. Eusine suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of Alakazam and Entei. He had lost all 10 of his stock while Alakazam and Entei only lost 1 stock each.

"Alakazam, how could pull such a cheap move?" he fumed. "Putting you and Entei on the same team without me knowing, that's pretty pathetic!"

Alakazam and Entei resisted every urge to scream at him, with both Pokémon well-knowing who was _really _the pathetic one. The pathetic person who KNEW that Entei was having a rough time and refused to negotiate with him, the pathetic person who also knew that Raikou was in trouble somewhere and wouldn't release him so he could help his brother, and the pathetic person who kept Entei as ransom for Suicune… both of them truly knew who was being the pathetic one. Alakazam dropped his remote and began to walk away.

"Where are you going, Alakazam?"

"My Pokéball." he sniped at Eusine. "Don't talk to me until dinner." With that, Alakazam found his Pokéball and opened it. He transformed into the red energy and shut himself inside.

Eusine seemed confused and irritated at Alakazam's behavior. "Geez, what's got him all up in a knot?"

"You don't know?" Entei sighed at the man, finding it hard to believe he was this oblivious. "You don't know WHY he's mad at you?"

Eusine shrugged. "I understand that you're mad at me. But why would he be? He doesn't have a whole lot of reason to be. I haven't done anything to him."

Entei growled. "Let me say this once and only once Eusine. You want to know why he's so pissed off at you? It's because of the way you've treated me."

"But that doesn't even concern him!"

"That doesn't matter!" Entei yelled, his voice now getting extremely loud and a bit frightening. "Now listen up, you bastard! He's disappointed in you!"

"Entei! Don't you dare say…!"

"He's disappointed in you because you refuse to understand my situation here! Eusine, you're only thinking of yourself, and you're not thinking about the Pokémon! A damn good trainer thinks of his Pokémon and what's best for them! You're keeping me here just to lure my sister to you! You're the COMPLETELY pathetic one! You're failing to acknowledge the fact that keeping me here while you KNOW that my brother's in trouble! I have NO idea where he's at, NO idea if he's OK or not, NO idea if he's even ALIVE, and it scares me like HELL! You got me, Eusine? IT SCARES ME LIKE HELL!"

Finally, after a huge yell fest and all of Entei's anger had been unleashed, he left himself vulnerable. After his manic roaring and after he came to a calmer and silent state, he found himself whispering,

"It scares me, Eusine." he said, his voice now cracking.

Walking slowly, he made his way over to the Master Ball he had been caught in. He tapped the button softly and let himself inside, waiting for when Eusine would release him and Alakazam for dinner.

* * *

><p><em>7:00 p.m.<em>

The silence around the dinner table that night was incredibly awkward. Nobody felt like talking to one another with Eusine, Entei, and Alakazam all remaining uncomfortably quiet. Eusine used his fork to twiddle around and mess with his Chinese noodles (He had ordered out yet again because the man couldn't cook to save his life).

Finally, Entei had quite enough of the deafening silence and spoke up, albeit softly.

"Did you reconsider it?"

Eusine sighed. He had been oblivious to Entei's request to release him before, but now he was wondering whether or not to alter the possibility. It was always Eusine's dream to meet Suicune live, but he started to wonder if he might be taking things a bit too far this time.

"Entei… I just… I just don't know."

Alakazam also stated his voice to Eusine. "Master," he began respectfully. "Maybe you should rethink your decision. It's not right to keep him here when his brother could be in trouble."

Deep down, somewhere inside himself, Eusine knew his most trusted friend of many years was right. He knew what he was doing was wrong. He knew he shouldn't be holding Entei as ransom against his will for Suicune. He knew he shouldn't restrict Entei from leaving when his brother was lost and possibly in lethal danger. He knew he shouldn't be doing ANY of these things.

But yet…

Eusine had always wanted to meet Suicune. He has dreamed of meeting Suicune face to face someday ever since his grandfather told him stories of the beautiful Beast as a young child. He had heard many rumors of the Beast and hunted her for many years. Eusine devoted his entire life to finding her, and would do anything to meet the magnificent Beast. But the question for him was, 'Am I really willing to go this far?'

Entei and Alakazam both looked up to Eusine again, wondering if he had been considerate enough to change his mind.

"I'll ask again." said a seemingly patient Entei, though his tone of voice suggested the opposite. "Will you release me so I may try to find my brother? …Please?"

"I… I… need some time to think about it."

Entei sighed. "Damn it, Eusine. I don't know if my brother HAS time. He could be DEAD now, for all you care."

"One night." the caped man told Entei.

"Hmm?"

"Give me one night to think about it."

Entei and Alakazam looked towards each other. The expression on Entei's face to the Psychic Pokémon seemed to convey, _"Are we still on for the escape?"_

Alakazam, knowing what Entei was thinking even without reading his mind, nodded.

"One night." Eusine repeated.

Entei turned towards Eusine. Whether or not Eusine decided to release him, he still knew he had to escape tonight. If Eusine decided against releasing him, then he'd stuck here for even longer. Entei wasn't willing to take that chance.

"OK, you have one night. Tell me your choice in the morning." Entei lied, knowing full well that he would not be here when Eusine woke up the next day.

"Thank you. With that, I think we all have had enough for one day. I'm going to bed."

Eusine recalled Entei to his Pokéball, activating the ball's lock to prevent him from escaping. Eusine tucked the Pokéball in his pocket and walked off to his room. Eusine left Alakazam to the guest bedroom since he preferred to sleep there most nights. Little did Eusine know is that this would prove to be a mistake…

* * *

><p><em>11:00 p.m.<em>

Alakazam slowly blinked his eyes open inside the guest bedroom. Crawling out of the bed quietly, he looked at the digital clock on the nightstand next to the bed.

_"11:00." _he noticed. _"Eusine should be asleep by now."_

Beginning to walk out of the room, he slowly peeked his eyes out of the small crack. He wanted to scan around and make sure that Eusine wasn't up around the house out of bed since he knew that Eusine sometimes sleepwalked.

_"I think Eusine's still in bed."_

He walked out of the guest room quietly. The guest room was on the first floor, but Eusine's room was on the second. Alakazam knew he had to be careful tip-toeing up the stairs. Normally, to get somewhere he would teleport, but he didn't want to risk Eusine hearing him.

He slowly and cautiously walked up the stairs to Eusine's bedroom. Alakazam, knowing that a select few steps were very loud and creaky, simply skipped over the steps. Finally, he reached the room, again slowly peeking into Eusine's room.

Inside his room, Eusine was lying quietly in his bed, tossing and turning softly with Entei's Pokéball standing on the nightstand nearby. However, he couldn't seem to fall completely asleep. His mind was still on the topic of whether or not to release Entei to help his brother.

Alakazam carefully tip-toed past him, and made sure not to step on anything loud that could wake him in the disaster area that was his room. While he was getting through said disaster area, he heard Eusine talking to himself.

"No… Entei… Suicune… Please, I only want to meet you… I just… Alakazam, get out! Please stay here, Suicune…"

He eventually reached Entei's Pokéball, and snatched it from the nightstand. He looked over to the door, which was a risky distance from the door. Alakazam decided that teleporting out of the room was less risky than teleporting in, so he quickly and quietly focused his mind and teleported silently out of the room.

Alakazam found himself just outside Celadon City, on the same route he and Entei had been training on earlier that day. Seeing that no humans were around, Alakazam used this chance to release Entei from his Pokéball. Pressing the button on the purple sphere, a red beam of energy shot out and rematerialized itself into Entei.

Entei, realizing he was outside of the Master Ball that had trapped him, turned towards Alakazam.

"Wow… Alakazam… I don't really know what to say except… thank you." Entei smiled.

"Thank you is all you need to say."

Alakazam put the Master Ball that had enslaved Entei in his hands and crushed it, freeing him.

"What are you going to do?" Entei asked the Psychic Pokémon.

"…I don't really know. Eusine's not the same person I remember anymore." Alakazam muttered to himself. "He's… I think he's become TOO obsessed with Suicune. I heard him talking in his sleep about her."

"What kind of things did he say?"

"He was muttering about how he STILL wants to meet Suicune and keep her. He's been doing this almost every night, and he's only been getting worse. From what I can hear of his dreams, he's starting to care more about catching Suicune than me…"

"…Come with me."

"Why?"

"You said Eusine wants to meet Suicune, right?"

"Well, yeah."

"If you help me find my sister Suicune and my brother Raikou… maybe I could convince Suicune to help you out. Maybe meeting Suicune live one time is all he needs."

"…OK." Alakazam answered. "Maybe if he has the chance to simply interact with Suicune again, he could snap out of his obsession and get back to caring about the Pokémon that's always been with him from the start."

"I think it just might work. Let's go."

And with that, Entei and Alakazam continued down Route 16, hoping to eventually find both the Water Beast Suicune and the Electric Beast Raikou…

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Yes, Chapter 12's done! So, Entei's finally busted out of Eusine's captivity and Alakazam's coming along to help him. Perhaps if Eusine could meet Suicune one more time, his obsession just might die down…

As always, read and review!

Oh, and Merry Christmas / Happy Hanukkah / Kwanzaa / whatever.


	13. Pewter City: 1 Day After Raikou

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 13: Pewter City: 1 Day After Raikou

* * *

><p>By the time Ethan, Lyra, Buddy, and Suicune reached Pewter City, it was already midday, around 2 in the afternoon. The trek through Viridian Forest took longer than they had expected, and when they got out, everyone was famished. Ethan had already recalled Suicune to her Pokéball so her appearance in Pewter wouldn't cause a commotion. The trio was walking through the streets, attempting to continue on their way.<p>

"Boy, I'm starved." Buddy muttered, looking at some nearby fast food joints. "Hey Ethan, think we can stop somewhere to grab a bite?"

Ethan laughed. "I was thinking the same thing, Buddy. Let's stop to get a burger or something, and then we'll get going to Celadon."

"Shouldn't you stop by the Pokémon Center and get some of your Pokémon out?" Lyra mentioned. "Maybe get out a flying Pokémon who could just fly us to Celadon?"

"I can't. Togekiss is the only 'Mon I have that's strong enough to carry both of us, but her wings are injured. I told you that a week ago."

Buddy rolled his eyes. "And I'm guessing the poor girl suffers from short-term memory loss, am I right?"

"Hey!" Lyra shouted back, fuming.

"You don't need to be so rude, Buddy." Ethan scolded him. "Her point still stands. After we grab some lunch, I should stop by there to pick up some of my Pokémon."

Buddy shrugged his shoulders. "All right, but I'm telling you, I can take trainers on myself. You saw me obliterate that Bug Catcher's team."

"Buddy, how many times do I have to tell you? A diverse team is what makes a trainer successful. You can't do everything yourself. Working as a team is what-"

Lyra looked off into the distance, noticing something of interest. "Hey, what's that?" she interrupted the two.

"What are you talking about?" Buddy glared at her.

"There, at the Pokémart. Something's going on."

The trio began to walk up to the Pokémart, with Buddy's and Ethan's curiosity stirred up. The closer they got, the better they could make out the details.

"Is that a wreck?" Lyra asked.

"Oh no, Lyra." replied Buddy. "A red pick-up crashed into the glass windows of the Pokémart with blood and broken beer bottles all over is definitely NOT a wreck!"

"You don't have to be so mean about it…" she muttered to herself.

"Hey." Ethan called out to Lyra and Buddy, interrupting them.

"Yeah?"

"Come take a look at this."

Lyra and Buddy walked up to Ethan, who was bent down looking inside the car, which had flipped upside-down.

"I think there's something inside." Ethan crouched down onto his knees and carefully crawled inside.

"What is it?"

"A cloth, I think. But there's something written on it. I'm kind of curious, but since the police aren't here…"

"Speaking of the police, shouldn't they be here, taking care of this kind of stuff?" wondered Lyra.

"Well, there's a whole squadron of them over by the Pewter City Museum of Science." mentioned Buddy, looking down the street at them. "I wonder what they're doing over there?"

"Ethan, do you mind if we…?"

"No, go ahead. I'll be… ouch… out in a second."

"All right…" shrugged Lyra. "Come on, Buddy!"

"…Sure." he muttered, crossing his arms as they walked over there.

* * *

><p>"Almost… got it…"<p>

Ethan was still crouched in the pick-up, trying to reach a red cloth on the other side of the car. He couldn't go through the other side of the car since the front passenger door was crushed. Just from trying to get inside the car, he had cut his shorts and the skin on his legs and hands. He was reaching over the body of the man in the car, who was already dead from the crash.

His hand was hovering just in reach of the cloth, which was snagged under the seat and dangling from above. In one swift motion, he yanked it and the cloth came out, along with a book hidden under the seat. He grabbed the book as well, and then headed out from under the car. He stood up, looking at the cuts and scrapes on himself from getting into the sharp glass.

"Ah great." he sighed. "Guess I'll have to check in somewhere to get these cuts treated." Ignoring the bleeding, painful cuts for the time being, he looked at the cloth and the book he had found inside.

The cloth itself was red and turned out to be a wearable robe, with the Greek Omega symbol on it enclosed in a yellow circle. He flipped the cloth backwards to see words marked on the back and in English too. It read:

_"To rid the universe of all mortals inferior_

_To repair the galaxies with machine superior_

_And to have obedience instilled with fear_

_What a wonderful world it would be…"_

Ethan read the contents again, to make sure he wasn't imagining this. After re-analyzing it, he wondered if this was just some silly game… or was it something much more serious? Nevertheless, having experience with criminals in the past, he had a feeling this wasn't something to take lightly. He took his pack off and stuffed the robe in there, thinking it might be important later.

He looked at the book in his hands. It was large and had a graphite drawing of a red mechanical eye on the cover. Just looking at the book made him feel ill at ease.

_"A mechanical eye?" _he wondered. _"Could that be the 'machine superior' that robe was talking about?"_

He glanced at the cover again and decided that he would read it later. For the time being, he stuffed the book inside the pack along with the robe. He left the scene and went ahead to catch up with Lyra and Buddy at the Pewter City Museum.

* * *

><p>He found Lyra and Buddy inside the museum, talking to one of the curators about an incident that had happened yesterday.<p>

"-And so right now we're trying to figure out who these thieves are and why they would want…"

"Lyra!"

Lyra turned around from talking to the museum curator and dashed up to Ethan.

"What happened? What's with all of the commotion here?" Ethan asked her.

"The curators told me that yesterday morning, two Pokémon came here and stole the Enigma Stone. They used the fire alarm as a distraction and replaced it with a stone that the museum just determined was a fake."

"That doesn't make sense. What would Pokémon want with the Enigma Stone? I could see Team Rocket stealing it, but Pokémon?"

"I honestly don't know, Ethan. All the curator told me is that the stone is rumored to hold the soul of either Latios or Latias. Oh my, what's with all of your cuts?"

"It's fine. I'll get them treated later." he told Lyra. "Hey!" Ethan called out to the curator, a young man with brown hair and green eyes. Nothing was extremely notable about him. "Mister…"

"Please call me Randall, everyone else does." the curator told him. "Do you need something?"

"Yes, do you know who the Pokémon that stole the Enigma Stone are? I'd like to help out, if that's all right."

"I apologize, sir. But we are not allowed to reveal the identities of the thieves to just anyone."

"He's not just ANYONE!" Buddy told him. "He single-handedly saved Johto's ass from Team Rocket! Ethan Gold! Ring a bell?"

Randall seemed surprised to learn this. "Wait, wait; let me get this straight. You're THE Ethan? You're THE Ethan that stopped Team Rocket from taking over Johto 8 years ago? You're THE Johto Champion Ethan? That Ethan?"

Ethan flashed his trademark smirk, the one he would often use after pulling off a successful battle. "Well… If you want to put it that way, then yes. Yes, I am."

"Oh! Well then, please forgive me, sir!" Randall said, startled by this information.

"It's no problem."

"Follow me; I'll take you guys to the security room, where the footage is kept." He walked off down a hallway on the side of the main crossing. The trio followed behind, and kept going until they reached a room that had 'Security Room: Authorized Personnel Only' on the door. The curator reached into his pocket and pulled out a ring of keys, and used one of them to unlock the door.

"Thank you again, sir." Ethan told him.

"It's nothing. The tape's inside the machine, so all you have to do is turn on the screen."

"Sure." Lyra said.

"Oh, and one more thing, Ethan. Apparently, these Pokémon who stole the Enigma Stone used some sort of cloaking device."

"A cloaking device? How would Pokémon get their paws on something like that?" Lyra asked. Buddy would have interjected something snarky, but he was just as confused as her, so he kept silent.

"I don't honestly know; but we had Professor Oak come here earlier and mess around with the footage. He was able to find a split-second in the video where the cloaking device flashed. Just look at the paused screen. I've got to go Ethan, there's a huge press storm coming in, and if they knew you were here…"

"I'd hate to find out." Ethan chuckled. "Thanks again, Randall."

"No big. See ya later." he told to him and departed from the room.

Ethan shut and locked the door behind the curator so the press wouldn't see the Johto Champion if they came by. That was the only thing Ethan hated about being the Johto Champion, the press would NEVER leave you alone. They always wanted to know the details of the battle, ask for interviews, and even looked at his prized Pokémon. It got pretty annoying, and he wished he didn't have to deal with this aspect whenever he came back to Kanto or Johto.

Ethan, thinking they were secure for the time being, released Suicune from her Pokéball. The red light zapped out of the ball and rematerialized into the Beast of Water.

"Thanks, Ethan. I was beginning to get bored in there."

"You want me to help you catch up on-"

"No thank you, I heard everything from inside. Still, why are you so interested in this robbery that happened at the museum?"

"If it was enough to keep the police force distracted from a totaled pick-up at… or IN the Pokémart, then it would have to be something really big. Besides, you never know. Maybe something here will help us find your counterparts, Suicune."

"You might have a point."

"Can I just turn on the damn screen now?" Buddy asked, starting to lose his patience.

Ethan rolled his eyes. "You have GOT to learn to be more patient, Buddy. But yes, go ahead."

Buddy, looking around the panel in front of the screen, found a big red button that said 'ON'. Three guesses as to what it did. He pushed the button and the screen flickered alive. The evacuation of the museum could be seen on-screen, and the time was stamped '11:46 a.m.'. Two Pokémon stood out among the chaos, and everybody immediately recognized one of them…

"Raikou?" Suicune shouted, seeming startled at the fact that her _counterpart_ would stoop down to robbing a museum. But the question remained…

"Why?" she muttered. "This doesn't make sense. Raikou… sure, he can be kind of a jerk, but he wouldn't do something like this."

"Wait a sec…" Ethan looked up at the screen. "Who's that Pokémon? The one with Raikou?"

"It's a Typhlosion." Buddy answered for him (despite Ethan's question being rhetorical). "But… you don't see one like THAT every day…"

Suicune moved her eyes from Raikou, who was swapping the stones, to a Typhlosion who was running towards Raikou with an exit in the distance. However, the Typhlosion in question wasn't your typical Typhlosion. The Typhlosion had parts of his body that were not natural, parts that were man-made and attached, as well as melded into his body. What stood out besides the Typhlosion's metal chest and left arm, was a wire that protruded from a pack on his body to his HEAD.

"A… cyborg Pokémon?" muttered Ethan, confused. "That's a new one…"

Lyra simply looked to the cyborg Pokémon with a puzzled and curious expression on her face, rather than one of fear.

"Well, we can assume this guy's bad." Buddy said, quite sure of himself.

"We haven't even met this 'Mon in the flesh yet. How can you…?"

"Ethan, it's obvious. Guy's forcing Raikou to do something he clearly wouldn't do. Plus, look at him! He's a CYBORG! He's OBVIOUSLY EVIL!"

"Come on Buddy, I'm sure there are plenty of good cyborgs in fiction."

"Name one." Buddy dared.

Ethan stood there for a while, trying to think of one. The Borg? Out. Terminator? Out. Darth Vader? …Ethan did not have a good selection to choose from.

"Uhh… hmm. I'm stumped." Ethan sighed.

"Told you." Buddy taunted him.

"HEY!"

"GUYS!" Suicune interrupted them. "Quit. Arguing. Seriously, it's like listening to Raikou and Entei fight over who is Mom's favorite ALL OVER AGAIN! Look, let's just set the Typhlosion aside until we find Raikou. If Raikou's with him, then we'll judge whether or not said cyborg is good. Agreed?"

"Yeah, sure." shrugged Ethan.

"Whatever." mumbled Buddy.

Suicune sighed. She was beginning to wish that Raikou hadn't ever left the cave…

"Still, all we have is this picture to go by for Raikou. That's not enough to find him."

Ethan stood there for a second and decided to share his recent discovery with the two Water types as well as Lyra. "Lyra, you know when you and Buddy went ahead to the Museum without me?"

"Yeah, you stayed behind with that overturned car, why do you ask?"

"Well, I found some… rather peculiar things under it. Let me show you." Ethan took his pack off and knelt down to open it. As he did, Lyra noticed the cuts and scrapes on his legs.

"Did you get those cuts from crawling inside the car? Ethan!"

"Don't worry about it. I'll get them treated later. Right now, I've got something to show y'all."

Ethan reached into his pack and pulled out two things for Lyra, Buddy, and Suicune to see: A book, and a red robe.

"What are those things?" Buddy asked his master. "What's in the book?"

"I haven't read the book yet," he told him. "but I DID find some text on the back of this red robe." Ethan flipped the robe onto its' front side, showcasing the back and the text imprinted on it.

"To rid the universe of all mortals inferior…" Buddy read off of the text.

"To repair the galaxies with machine superior…" muttered Suicune.

"And to have obedience instilled with fear…" Lyra uttered the words, a bit nervously.

"What a wonderful world it would be…" Ethan finished the verse.

Buddy looked at the text again, astonished. "…What the hell is this?"

"I don't know," Ethan answered him. "but I think something serious could be going on here."

"Do you think it's Team Rocket?" Lyra asked her friend.

"Well, this doesn't really seem like them… then again, a lot could've changed since I put them down 8 years ago."

"Hmm… why would that book and robe be in that driver's car, anyway?"

"Beats the heck out of me, Suicune." Ethan replied to the Water Beast. "I don't anything about that guy, or why he would have this stuff. Though… right now, I think we should still focus on finding your counterparts."

"Yeah, you're right. But who do we go after first, Raikou or Entei?"

"I think Entei's our best bet. All we know is that Raikou WAS here. But we know where Entei is right now. It'd still be best to go after him first."

"All right." Buddy replied, cracking his knuckles. "Now that we know who we're going after, can we FINALLY get something to eat?"

"OK! OK, Buddy! Geez, patience really isn't your best virtue." Ethan pulled out Suicune's Pokéball and recalled her.

"Suicune, return."

The Water Beast transformed into red energy and was recalled into the Pokéball. Ethan stuffed the ball in his pack, along with the book and robe. He swung the pack onto his back and stood up.

"Aren't you going to read what's in that book?" Lyra asked the Johto Champion.

"I figure it's probably better if we read it on the go. We need to get to Entei as soon as we can. Plus, we should keep this to ourselves right now. You know how hopelessly inept the police are in Kanto and Johto…"

"Yeah… hopefully someday, they'll reorganize the system and get a better police force…"

"One that doesn't let an entire team of criminals slip past their noses." Ethan joked.

"Or one that doesn't call for 10-year-old kids to save the region." Lyra laughed. The two unlocked the door and headed out of the security room. When they reached the center plaza of the museum, they looked up at an analog clock on the wall.

"Wow, it's already 7:00." Ethan realized. "The day goes by too fast."

"Yeah, it doesn't FEEL like it's been that long of a day."

"Then again, we spent most of it battling those Bug Catchers in the Viridian Forest…" the Champ shrugged. "Oh well."

"I swear…" Buddy quietly muttered, clutching his stomach. "If I don't get something to eat soon, I'm devouring the girl."

"Hey guys," Ethan said, walking out of the museum. "There's a Lenny's just a short walk from here. Want to head there?"

"Sure, I don't mind."

"Depends." Buddy posed to his master. "Today's Friday, right?"

"…Yeah… Why…? Oh, right. Friday Night Fish Fillet. All right Buddy, but we'll have to get it to go. We want to try to get to Eusine's as soon as possible."

"Fine by me." he grinned. "As long as I get my grub."

* * *

><p>The trio went down the sidewalk to the nearby Lenny's. Buddy's stomach was growling as loud as an Exploud could shout. He was looking over at Lyra, who was starting to look pretty darn tasty. Buddy smacked his lips while over at her, making her feel quite uncomfortable. Ethan, walking ahead of the two, seemed to be completely oblivious to this.<p>

"Hey Buddy, once we get you something to eat, we'll head to the Pokémon Center, and crash there for the night. It's getting kinda dark, and…" he stopped himself. Ethan always preferred to travel by daylight; the night made him feel very ill at ease. It was one of those silly little fears you were supposed to get rid of as a child, but even at 18, he still isn't very comfortable in the dark.

"…Yeah. In the morning, I'll get some 'Mon out, and we'll continue on to Cerulean City."

After a few minutes of walking, the trio arrived at Lenny's, the local joint that was in nearly every town in Kanto and Johto.

"I'm going to go in and get our food." Ethan said. "Lyra, what do you want?"

"I'm not really hungry. Just a salad or something will do."

"All right, I'll be right out. You two get along nice now." Ethan chuckled as he walked towards Lenny's by himself. "Oh, and Buddy?"

"Yeah?"

"Don't eat Lyra!" he laughed, joking. "Be back in a sec!" He disappeared into the Lenny's building, leaving Lyra alone with the Feraligatr with one big appetite…

Buddy looked over suspiciously at Lyra, who was busy try to… not look eatable. Buddy grinned as he smacked his lips again, and continued to play the psychological game with her. He knew that he couldn't eat the girl (lest his master kill him), but it was just too much fun to mess with her mind.

Lyra, trying to keep herself occupied, pulled out her Pokédex and looked around in it. She wasn't really looking for anything in particular; she was just browsing through all of the Pokémon registered on it. Anything to keep her mind off of the hungry alligator next to her…

"I'm back!" Ethan shouted, coming out of Lenny's with three bags in hand.

"Oh, thank God." Lyra sighed, glad Ethan was back. "I thought your Feraligatr was gonna eat me out of starvation for a sec."

"Oh, he wouldn't do anything like that." Ethan assured his friend.

"Yeah, I'm just messing with your head. Don't take it so seriously…"

Lyra groaned, not amused with the little game her friend's Feraligatr had subjected her to.

"Anyway… Buddy, your fish fillet; Lyra, your salad; as for myself, I just got a hamburger." He tossed the two bags to Buddy and Lyra who caught them. He kept the last bag in his hands, and then noticed the dark sky. He shivered nervously.

"Umm… Pokémon Center's a little ways away. Let's get over there to grab a room… and fast, preferably."

The trio started their way to the Pokémon Center, the distance there being only a short walk. Buddy and Lyra both didn't mind the dark walk. To them, it was a nice change from the daytime and presented the same location in a very different way. To Ethan, it was almost a nightmare. He was never at ease with the nighttime. One mugger trying to rob you in the dark at age 10 on your Pokémon journey and things aren't quite the same... even if you have a giant Feraligatr to protect you.

A rustle from the east of Ethan brought his attention over there.

"What was that?"

"Ethan, relax. It's just a few leaves." Lyra assured him, pointing to something in the dark.

Once Ethan could make what it was moving in the dark, he saw it was indeed only a few leaves rustling on the sidewalk. He chuckled sheepishly, just trying to shake it off.

* * *

><p>They eventually made it to the Pokémon Center, where Ethan made a sigh of relief. Fortunately, the Pokémon Center of Pewter City wasn't too busy tonight. Only a few people were there, saving him from the possibility of paparazzi bombarding him with questions and begging him for interviews. The trio walked up to the nurse of the center, facing away from them and greeted her.<p>

"Excuse me, Nurse Joy?"

The nurse turned around to see a young, handsome, black-haired guy along with a brown-haired girl next to him, and a Feraligatr that towered over both of them.

"Oh! Johto Champion Ethan! And his friend! What can I do for you?"

Lyra grumbled about how nobody remembered her name while Ethan talked to the nurse.

"We need a place to stay for the night before we head off to Cerulean City in the morning. Is that OK?"

"Sure! Just follow me to the back!" Nurse Joy led the trio to a hallway behind the main entrance, to a room, and then handed Ethan a key.

"Here's the key! Just call me or one of my other sister Nurse Joys if you need anything!"

"Thank you, Nurse Joy… umm… which number are you again?"

"Oh! I'm number 74!"

"Oh yeah! You're the one with the crazy Arcanine!"

Buddy gulped as he remembered his bad memories with that Arcanine. It was after Ethan and he first beat Brock, and then came to the Pokémon Center to heal him. Unfortunately, it was 'Bring Your Pet to Work Day' and Nurse Joy #74 had a… not right in the head Arcanine. Since Buddy was only a Totodile at that time, he couldn't really defend himself from the rabid beast.

"So… many… swirlies…" Buddy whispered to himself.

"Yep! But don't worry about him! He's all safe and sound in my room! Maybe!"

Buddy quietly walked into the room, praying that said Arcanine was indeed safe and sound at Nurse Joy #74's home. Ethan and Lyra followed behind him and shut the door.

Ethan, instead of bothering to even put on pajamas, just immediately plopped down on the bed and went to sleep. Buddy took off Ethan's pack and grabbed his Pokeball from it. He recalled himself so he could crash. Lyra was the only one that bothered to go into the bathroom and change into her pajamas. Once she was done, she turned off the lights and went to sleep.

_"I wonder…" _she thought. _"What's in that book, anyway?"_

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Sorry to be so long in updating! Life... and stuff, you know. Anyway, seems that Ethan figured out about this crazy cult. But the question for him is, what the heck are these guys after? And thanks for reading! Next chapter will be something interesting with Zekrom...

P.S. - There's a poll on my profile regarding this story. Check it out if you want to.


	14. Dreams of the Missing

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 14: Dreams of the Missing

* * *

><p>Internal Clock:<p>

2:00 a.m.

Typhlosion couldn't sleep. Thoughts clouded his head as he tried to fall back into unconsciousness. He tossed and turned, getting his charging wires tangled up.

Internal Clock:

2:05 a.m.

"Ugh." he muttered. "Still can't sleep." After the fruitless efforts, he sat up in his bed and looked at the cyberized Raikou at the foot.

"There… has to be a way to reverse what happened. He can't say like this. I just hope Zekrom's right and this isn't permanent for him."

He lay back down in his bed and pulled a sheet over him. "Still… I probably shouldn't blame myself so much. We just found him… a little bit late."

He closed his eyes, still conscious, and continued talking to himself over the issue. "I wonder how Raikou feels about this. Not the brainwashed Raikou, the real Raikou. If we can break that hold… I wonder how he would react."

Typhlosion still remembered how he reacted when he was knocked out by that Pikachu in the Kanto Power Plant. A little over 60% of his body was completely fried and rendered useless. He thought he was dead for sure. But he certainly didn't count on being revived… as a cyborg.

* * *

><p>"Why did you let them do this to me? I'm… They made me this… A mechanical monster. Why? You saw them take me in, Victor; why didn't you stop them?"<p>

Victor the Infernape kept silent as he leaned against the wall, looking at the then-a-Quilava. "…You're my friend, Quil. I-I didn't want to lose you." he confessed.

"There could've been another way! Surely a Max Revive or something of the sort…"

"Quil… if you could've seen the horrible condition you were in… if they hadn't installed those implants… you wouldn't be here right now."

"…" Quilava clenched his fist, having mulitple emotions swirl through him. He remained silent at his tension began to build up.

"Quilava?"

"…" Quilava walked over to his friend quietly. He was about to punch him... but as he standed there, his fist shook and didn't bring himself to do it.

After all, why should he threaten Victor? He confessed to himself that if anyone was more to blame, it was him and not his friend.

Standing in front of him, he didn't know what to say, or even what to feel. Should he be angry? Thankful? Sad? Or perhaps all three?

Victor, seeming to understand the thoughts that clouded the confused cyborg's mind, placed his arms around him and gently hugged him. At that moment, Quilava seemed to finally realize that he would have no other choice but to adapt to this new life. One that was new to him, and even one that was a little bit scary. But he still knew that he had a friend he could rely on. He slowly put his arms around Victor's and softly cried.

"Thank you." the cyborg whispered.

* * *

><p>Typhlosion smiled when he recalled the memory. He had to go through all kinds of new training, since he was now a cyborg model. He had to learn how to use his new parts as well as how to properly take care of them. He had become someone… or rather, something very different. But for every new challenge he had to face, Victor was always there for him.<p>

Now, it was Typhlosion's turn to be there for Raikou.

No matter how hard the road was ahead for them, a way _could _be found.

* * *

><p>2:30 a.m.<p>

Raikou was slumbering, his consciousness having been shut down via command. Although his conscious mind had been reprogrammed, his subconscious, his dreaming state, was unaffected.

_"What… happened?"_

In his dreams, Raikou appeared to have full control of his body. Unlike the real world, he was able to think his own thoughts and perform his own actions. His subconscious mind had been tapped into during the earlier analysis, but he had no way of communicating that.

The dream world he was in… it was beautiful. In a vast green field, flowers were blooming and his energy was limitless. When he saw blue butterflies flying around, he realized that this was the fantasy he had conjured up when he first came here.

Raikou crouched down and laid his full body on the flowering field, purring contently.

_"I haven't felt like this… in forever."_

After happily rolling around in the field for a while, Raikou became still and thought to himself.

_"What happened to me, back in the real world? That… device they strapped me to… those people… they said I'd be brainwashed to serve the Cyber Creator, whoever that is. But… if that is the case… then why do I have full reign of my dreams?"_

Raikou sighed. _"When I wake up again, I'll be stuck in my brainwashed state… I won't be able to talk to Typhlosion OR Victor. This is really way too weird to comprehend. This hardly makes any sense… What are Entei and Suicune going to think? They'll probably be scared out of their loving minds. Not that I'd blame them. Hmm. If I could just find a way to communicate with them…"_

Raikou sat there for several minutes, trying to think of something, anything that could help him. Looking around, and realizing that there was nothing he could do, he lay back down in the flower field and stayed in the dream realm.

* * *

><p>3:00 a.m.<p>

Victor was inside his Pokéball simulation, lying down and fiddling around with a blade of grass in his hand. Unfortunately, he had accidently incinerated it.

"Oops." he muttered. "Oh well."

He tilted his head back, viewing the night sky the simulation had provided. For something fake, he had to admit, it was darn pretty.

Unable to sleep, Victor instead found himself thinking. Something was bothering him, and he knew what it was.

Reshiram.

It wasn't so much that he was scared of her; in fact he had faced Legendaries before. It was more how Zekrom would react if he found out what happened to her.

Zekrom and Victor got along decently. Sure, they weren't as buddy-buddy as he and Ty; but they still called each other friends. To tell him something like that…

Victor sighed. "And he still thinks that she's in Unova."

What was he going to do? Victor was still tampering with the idea to tell Zekrom. On one hand, if Zekrom was told, he would know the truth… but it would shatter his soul. Zekrom said it himself that there was no known way to reverse a completed conversion. On the other hand, if Zekrom _wasn't _told, he would forever be left wandering what happened to her.

Thinking about the dilemma for a few minutes, he eventually came to a conclusion.

"Tomorrow." he said. "Tomorrow, I tell him. And tomorrow… I guess I'll have to shatter his heart…"

* * *

><p>3:15 a.m.<p>

Zekrom was counting the stars in the sky of his simulation. He was having a bit of trouble falling asleep and decided that numbering the stars could help lull him to sleep.

"Two hundred sixty-seven… Two hundred sixty-eight… Two hundred sixty-nine…"

Zekrom yawned. Finally after hours of counting fake stars, he got drowsy. As he moved in the grass and slipped into sleep, his dreams went to Reshiram…

* * *

><p>"Hey, Reshiram!"<p>

Reshiram turned her head around, looking back at Zekrom with blue, beautiful eyes and a soft, yet firm face.

"Yeah?"

"This… this day has been awesome, Reshi."

Zekrom looked around the beach he and Reshiram were on. The waves pulled up and crashed back down on the beach's sand, just a few feet away from the two dragons. The beach itself, while pristine and vast, was also completely barren, except for them.

"Yeah."Reshiram smiled. "It definitely has."

The duo faced the horizon, with the sun setting and lighting the skies in a red, warm fire.

"Uhh… Reshi?"

The white dragon twirled her head. "What is it, Zekrom?"

Behind his back, Zekrom was nervously fumbling with a dripping wet small box. Unfortunately, Victini thought it would be funny to flush the tiny box down the toilet. It took him all day to find the stupid thing. He stuttered as he tried to speak.

"Uh… um… well, Reshiram… We've… known each other for a long time…"

Reshiram grinned. "2,500 years is a lot of time to get to know somebody."

Zekrom chuckled. "I'll say. But um… I… want to ask you something. Something very important."

"If the question is sending Victini to military camp, I'd love to."

"YES!" he cheered. "But uhh… that's not the _main _question. The main question is…"

"Yes?"

Zekrom took the box from behind his back, opened it, and knelt down on one knee.

"Will you be my wife?"

Reshiram closed her eyes and smiled. She had long waited for the day that her love would propose to her. The two loved each other deeply, sharing a bond that had forged for over 2,500 years. One just wonders why Zekrom didn't propose _sooner…_

"Yes." she answered. "…Wait." Reshiram picked up the box. "Why is the box wet?"

"Victini…" Zekrom grumbled.

"That explains a bunch… You're not getting back at him…"

"Aww…"

"…not without ME, that is!"

Zekrom smirked. He took his almost-wife by the hand and started to walk back down to the Dragonspiral Tower.

"Ok, here's what I was thinking…"

* * *

><p>Zekrom smiled.<p>

_"Someday." _he thought. _"I will find her. We will find each other and go back to Unova to get married. Just… wait for me, Reshiram. I'll be back."_

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Yes, I agree, this chapter is short. And yes, I agree, it's filler. But I like this filler, darn it! XD

And yes, the title of the chapter is taken from a song (again). Specifically, Hymn for the Missing by Red. Link's on my profile (or copy and paste since the links are currently deactivated); if you listen to it, you'll figure out why I chose to name the chapter title after it.

We finally get a peek into the characters' heads. We'll see how they'll deal with their situations and see what they'll do tomorrow. Again, read and review!


	15. Fight Inside

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 15: Fight Inside

To the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are corrupted and do not believe, nothing is pure. In fact, both their minds and consciences are corrupted.

Titus 1:15

* * *

><p>Internal Clock:<p>

6:00 a.m.

Typhlosion was normally a very heavy sleeper. Most of the time, Victor had to be the one to wake him up. One memorable incident had Zekrom help Victor in ELECTROCUTING him. Today, however, was a rare exception in that he didn't sleep in. Aside from Raikou's predicament, something else nagged at him. Something he preferred to forget about.

That hieroglyphic in the Ruins of Alph.

He pulled the slab out of his pack, analyzing it again. It brought a sort of sharp pain to his stomach by looking at it. The expression on the cyborg's face in the hieroglyphic was one of pure spite and malice. The fire in his eyes showed no mercy.

The Infernape in the picture… it was even worse. Even though the Infernape's head was enclosed in a helmet, the emotion of fear could easily be seen in his face.

But the question remained… was it really him? Was he seriously 'prophesied' by this wacko religious cult to enslave all Pokémon? Even if it included his own friend? If so, he wanted absolutely nothing to do with it.

Should he tell Victor? Was it better to tell him or was it better to keep him in the dark about this?

Typhlosion didn't get much time to consider a choice, as Victor conveniently chose that moment to walk inside. Thinking quickly, he stuffed the slab back into his pack.

"Hey Victor…" Typhlosion chuckled nervously.

Victor's eyes narrowed. "What were you just holding there?"

"What do you mean?" he said, trying to play innocent.

"I saw you holding some kind of stone. What was it?"

"I wasn't holding anything."

Standing there for a few minutes pondering about it, Victor just decided to shrug it off for the time being.

"So, how'd you sleep?" Victor asked.

"Not well." Ty confessed. "I was up at 2 in the morning. Raikou's whole situation… I couldn't help but worry over it."

Victor sighed, recalling the time HE was up last night. Similar to the way Typhlosion felt guilty over Raikou's brainwashing, Victor didn't feel right keeping Reshiram's fate a secret from Zekrom.

"There's not much we can do about it at this point. The only thing we can do is to try to reinforce his original memories and pray it works."

"…What about Reshiram? Have you told Zekrom yet?"

Victor seemed surprised. "I… I didn't know you knew…"

"After thinking about to what happened to you back there, I recalled that Reshiram was there and… yeah, you know."

"No." he sighed. "I haven't told Zekrom yet. I'm kinda nervous to do it. But today's probably better than never." Victor looked over to the mechanized Raikou, who was still in a sleeping state. "I guess we should wake him up, huh?"

"Yeah… I think… I'm the only one who can." Typhlosion walked over to Raikou and rubbed the helmet on him.

"Hey Raikou… You kinda need to wake up…"

_"…Wake up…"_

_ "…OrDeR AcCePtEd."_

* * *

><p><em>Inside Raikou's conscious…<em>

_ "…OrDeR AcCePtEd."_

"Whoa!" The Raikou inside his own consciousness got flung through the air and crash-landed back on the ground. Looking around frantically, the flowers in the field began to wilt and the trees started to die as the world shook ferociously.

"What's happening?"

As he shouted this, a force… a powerful force with a malevolent purple aura surrounded him.

_"Relax… let me take control…" _a soothing, and almost irresistible voice said to him.

It violently pushed itself into Raikou as he tried desperately to fight it.

"No! Stop it! Get out! You-You can't…"

_"Stop resisting… you're only delaying the inevitable…"_

Raikou collapsed and began to viciously spasm on the ground, which now lay in ruins. His sudden jerks knocked away some of the wilting flowers trying so futilely to survive. He sunk his claws into the dead grass of the field, trying to keep a hold on himself.

"No! You can't… I-I won't let you!"

The force finally managed its' way into Raikou's body and overtook it. His soul, his spirit, and his conscious… they were enveloped in the dark aura and re-corrupted. The Raikou inside the subconscious stood up. Now, instead of looking natural, he again looked similar to his physical appearance in the real world. He now had the cybernetic parts grafted onto him and his eyes glowed with a corrupted purple.

_"…You have a strong will, Raikou. I congratulate you. Most beings don't last that long."_

"…WhY?"

_"Why? What a silly question. You already know why. You were explained that."_

"…WhAt… WhAt DoEs ThiS MeAN FoR mE?"

_"Oh, that's an easy one to answer. This is your life now. Every waking hour of your life… every moment you spend awake on this planet… you belong to the Cult of the Machine now. We control you. We control you and your outer body. You and your actions. But I think the funnest part is that you're fully aware of it. Every last second. Interesting, no?"_

At that moment, Raikou realized his whole world was crashing down around him. He was stuck in this nightmare… stuck… as an eternal slave and soldier.

"AnSWeR mE tHiS… WhO… WhO ArE yOu?"

_"As if I haven't been asked that a billion times. You'll find out in time."_

"HoW…How dO I fINd EnTEI aND SuiCUnE?"

_"You don't. Ever. You remain with us."_

"…nO… pLeASe…NO!"

* * *

><p>Raikou's eyes briefly flashed and the parts grafted on him could be heard starting up. He pushed himself off of the floor and looked at Typhlosion.<p>

"I AwAiT FuRtHeR InStRuCTioNs, MaSTeR."

_"ThiS… ThiS… nO…"_

Typhlosion sighed, getting tired of being called that. "Didn't I tell you yesterday NOT to refer to me as that?"

"…iT… iT iS HAbiT, MaSTeR."

"…Looks like I've got a lot of work to do. Speaking of which, Victor? Have you found out what we're doing today?"

Victor crossed his arms and closed his eyes, shaking his head. "You're not gonna like this, but…"

"I'll bite. What is it?"

"Well… I'm supposed to just practice in the Training Room today… with Zekrom; it's nothing new for me. You and Raikou, on the other hand…"

"Something tells me this isn't going to be good." Ty muttered to himself.

"Apparently, you two have a… rather special assignment. You two are supposed to hunt for a trainer in Johto named Ethan."

Typhlosion's eyes widened. "Ethan? You mean Johto Champion Ethan?"

_"EtHaN… wHy dOEs ThAT NamE SoUNdS faMiliAR?"_

"Yeah." Victor sighed. "That Ethan. But that's not the worst part of it. They want you to kidnap him. They want you to kidnap him and his Pokémon AND bring him back here."

Typhlosion stammered, trying to figure out what to make of it. Most of his assignments centered around battles and thievery. He has kidnapped before, but only Pokémon. Kidnapping HUMANS was a first, much less kidnapping the Johto Champion!

"Are they crazy? How do they honestly expect me to kidnap the Johto Champion? He has more years of experience and knowledge than I do; being a cyborg won't give me ANY edge! I'm good, but against the Johto Champ, I don't stand a chance!"

"There's not much I can say about it. Actually, I HAVE no say. They're Giovanni's direct orders too, so I don't think you're getting out of this one. And before you leave… you're supposed to consult with Giovanni in his office. The big man himself wants to personally give you two the specifics. He also wanted you inquire you about that cult, the one we investigated yesterday."

Typhlosion groaned. After the entire incident, he really just wanted to forget it ever happened. But it wasn't a possibility. If Giovanni wants to know what went down, then he's gonna KNOW what went down. On the chance that you were stupid enough to lie to him, when they find out what really happened (and they always do), things don't end up pretty for the liar. Giovanni had a particular favorite fate for the liars… yep, the Garchomps' chamber. At least, that's what they CLAIM; nobody knows for sure…

Raikou decided to cut in. "…EtHaN? GioVaNNi? MaSTeR, PaRdoN mY AsKinG, bUt… wHo aRe THeSe PeoPLe?"

_"StoP iT. YoU… YoU EViL… CuLt… BaSTaRdS… I KnoW… dO I kNOw…?"_

Typhlosion and Victor glanced at each other. "I've got training to do." Victor interjected, using the excuse to escape as he quickly bolted for the door. "Talk to you later!"

SLAM!

"…Yeah. Thanks a bunch, Victor." the cyborg muttered to himself as he turned to Raikou.

"Might as well start somewhere." he shrugged as he began to explain who Ethan and Giovanni were.

"Ethan… is a powerful trainer from the Johto region. Very powerful. Johto Champion powerful. The reason I was so startled to be ordered to kidnap Ethan is because he's an excellent trainer. From what I've heard around Johto, he's perhaps one of the powerful trainers in the entire region. He's not the Champ for nothing."

"…HoW aRe wE eXpECteD to CaPTurE hiM, MaSTeR?"

_"nO… wAiT… iS MaSTeR… iS iT MaSTeR… oR…?"_

"I don't know. I'm STILL trying to figure that out. And what did I say about…?"

"YeS, TyPHloSiOn. iF yOu dEsiRE, I WiLL aDDreSS yOu aS SucH."

"Well… it's a start. But I feel I should tell you about Giovanni before we see him."

"…"

"Yeah. Anyways, Giovanni is the leader of Team Rocket. To make a REALLY long story short, he briefly left Team Rocket to train, making them vulnerable. Ethan was the 10-year-old kid who kicked their asses and disbanded them. Obviously, that was temporarily. After Giovanni attempted suicide after Ethan defeated him at Tohjo Falls, he survived and came back here to resume running the place. I think I made that explanation kinda long."

"iT iS FiNe."

"What about Entei and Suicune? Do you remember them? Anything about them at all?"

"hMM…"

_"PiCtuRES… oF tWo… aNiMaLs… It'S FuZZy… I CaN'T MaKE OuT AnYthiNG ELsE…"_

"…nO, MaS- I mEAN, SiR."

Typhlosion sighed. He REALLY hoped this wasn't permanent and that Raikou just needed a little bit more time.

"Come on, Raikou. We have to get to Giovanni's office. They probably would have learned about this eventually, anyways…"

The walk there was quick and quiet. The two Pokémon didn't say much of anything to each other as they walked through the hallways. The feelings between the duo were awkward, and Ty just wanted to get there quickly.

Fortunately, it wasn't very long. Within maybe 2 minutes, the two stood outside Giovanni's office. Ty tried to think to himself about how he would explain this to him. The second they walk in there, he's going to have questions, and Ty's going to have to answer them.

"OK, Raikou?"

"YeS?"

"Just… umm… let me do the talking for awhile. I'm going to need to explain this to Giovanni, since he will ask questions. Please?"

"BuT, oF CoURsE."

Sighing, the two walked in, where Giovanni was sitting behind his desk in his chair as always. Giovanni was always a cool, calm, and collected individual, but he seemed puzzled when he laid eyes on Raikou.

"…Typhlosion?"

"Yes, sir?"

"Raikou is… different from when I last saw him. Do you have an explanation for this?"

"Well… it's a long story, sir."

"Oh, believe me. I have time." he said, sipping on his coffee.

"…You know that cult you had us investigate yesterday? The one you wanted the… assimilation technology from?"

"Yes. I believe you delivered those plans to me."

Typhlosion nodded. "Yes. We went, that is, Raikou, Victor and I, to the Ruins of Alph as ordered. We looked around and found this cult you informed us about. Victor and I got separated from Raikou, but the leader of the cult did give me the blueprints for the plans."

"Why would he give you the blueprints so easily? I had somewhat expected you to avoid confrontation."

"I'm not sure, sir." Ty fibbed. He didn't want Giovanni to know that he was some sort of 'Chosen One' in the cult.

"…Hmm. And Raikou? How did he end up like… this?" he said, gesturing to Raikou's entire body.

_"iT… WasN'T SuPPoSeD tO bE tHiS wAy."_

"…Well… with neither Victor's nor my own knowledge, they had captured him and confined him to a room deep in the Ruins. They were trying to brainwash him with some kind of machine. Now that I think about it, that machine looked a lot like the one on those blueprints. When their leader spilled the beans on what they were doing, we both went searching for him. We found him, got him out, and took him back here."

"…I see. Anything else you need to add? Is there anything else I should know about Raikou?"

_"Hmm. I think it's OK to tell him."_

"You see sir… they programmed him to obey me. Again, I didn't request for them to do this…"

"Really?" said Giovanni, leaving his chair and examining the technology quite intrigued with it. "Show it to me. If he obeys you, give him an order. Now."

Typhlosion, knowing he didn't have any other option, promptly complied. "Umm… sit, I guess."

Right then and there, Raikou went from standing on his four legs to sitting like a trained dog.

Giovanni, paying closer attention to Raikou now, told Typhlosion, "Give him another one."

_"D…DaMN YoU… GioVaNNi…"_

"Uh, play dead?"

Again, Raikou did as said and laid on the ground, pretending to be dead.

_"D-DeGRaDinG…"_

"Fascinating." Giovanni whispered softly to himself. "I must get my scientists to investigate further on those plans."

"Anyway, sir?" Ty said, interrupting Giovanni's train of thought. "Victor told me to come here and he also said you wanted to give us the specifics on capturing Ethan."

"Oh yes. Thank you for reminding me." he said, sitting back down on his desk chair. "As I called you two here for, you have direct orders from me to capture the Pokémon Trainer Ethan and bring him here."

"Uhh… no offense, sir, but… how do you expect us to do that? Ethan IS the Johto Champion! He even beat…" Typhlosion cut himself off there. He didn't DARE bring up Giovanni's humiliating defeat at the hands of the kid, unless he wanted to suffer painfully. Giovanni narrowed his eyes.

"Never mind, sir."

"Yes, I do know he IS a powerful trainer. Nevertheless, I think you can handle yourselves. Oh, and before I forget…"

Giovanni pulled open his desk drawer and took something out, then immediately handed to Typhlosion.

"A… gun, sir? You want me to shoot him?"

"Yes. But, of course, I need him alive. So what you hold in your hands is a tranquilizer gun. You and Victor are both experienced. You should have next to no trouble."

"But… why do you want him?"

"…Typhlosion, you will not question my orders, you will simply follow them. Understood?"

"…Understood, sir."

"Good. You're dismissed."

Typhlosion closed the door behind him as he stepped into the hallway, with Raikou still standing next to him. He looked at the gun. Though he was professionally trained in firearms, he really hated using them. It didn't feel right for an animal to use that kind of weapon, when he already had his natural (and a few unnatural) abilities to fall back on.

Typhlosion tried to think of a different way to get Ethan here. "Maybe I could just ask – oh who am I kidding? He's not going to come out of his own free will!"

Putting the firearm in his pack, he sighed and walked off, regretting the fact he'd have to knock Ethan unconscious and then bring him here.

"Let's go, Raikou."

"…YeS."

_"…nO."_

Making their way out of the base and into Mahogany Town, Ty couldn't help but wonder what Victor and Zekrom were up to…

* * *

><p>Zekrom woke up that morning feeling very cheery. After he reassured himself the night before that Reshiram was alright… he really began to have faith. He realized that maybe he didn't have 100% proof that Reshiram was OK; what made it easier to cope was a belief. Belief was just a gut instinct that everything would work out. He knew that Reshiram was still waiting for him, or knowing how headstrong she is, she might have even tried a few rescue attempts. Either way, once Zekrom figured a way out of here, the first stop was Unova to re-plan the wedding.<p>

Whistling to himself, Zekrom emerged from his Pokéball at 7 on the dot. Just as he was wondering to himself what he was going to do today, Victor came in.

"Hey, Victor. How you doing?"

"…" Victor didn't say anything as he leaned against the door frame. "…You're training with me today."

Zekrom looked at Victor, noticing something was off. "You OK, dude? You seem really… down."

"It's fine. Just… let's get going."

Shrugging his shoulders, Zekrom followed Victor through the corridors. Looking as Victor as they walked, Zekrom's curiosity with Victor only grew. Zekrom decided to make some small talk.

"Say, do you know WHO we're training against? Or… is it just you and me today? A one on one?"

"…I think it's just us." Victor told him. "From what I saw, we're the only ones in the arena for the day."

"'K then. Be sure to put up a good match, 'cause I'm feelin' my A-game today!" Zekrom chuckled.

"…You seem… unusually happy today."

"That's easy to explain. I really think things are looking up for me now. I just… I just have this great feeling. I have this great feeling that things are going to change soon. And I believe it'll be for the better."

_"You don't know the half of it, Zekrom…"_

Quickly enough, they arrived at the door to the arena; the same one Raikou was at when he was first brought here. Making their way in, both of the Pokémon noticed Archer, one of the Team Rocket executives, standing in the main arena. Victor avoided direct eye contact with Archer, as he never cared much for him, or any of the other executives for that matter.

"I don't think I need to ask what we're doing today, do I?" Victor said.

"Oh congratulations!" Archer snarked. "So the flaming monkey DOES have a brain."

"You know what, you can just…" Victor stopped himself. Foul-mouthing a Team Rocket executive wouldn't be good for him. "Never mind."

"Let's get started." Archer threw two Pokéballs up into the air. They snapped open and two Pokémon, a Houndoom and a Koffing, materialized out of them.

"OK then. Monkey, you're up first. You and Koffing."

Silently, Victor walked into the arena, and Zekrom stood outside, only allowed to watch. Archer retaliated almost immediately.

"Koffing, use Sludge!"

Koffing dashed up to Victor and quickly launched out the attack. Victor tried to dive down and out of the way, but the sludge got into his eyes, blinding him. Archer then used this chance to have Koffing tackle him.

"Whoa!" Getting knocked over briefly, he quickly rubbed the remainder of the sludge out of his eyes. As he got back up, Archer ordered Koffing to use Sludge again. Victor, not stupid enough to fall for the same trick twice, dodged to the left instead of diving and the attack missed him. It gave him a chance to use Stone Edge to immediately knock out Koffing. Archer scowled as Victor grinned smugly.

"Maybe you should get stronger Pokémon." he taunted.

"Maybe you should learn to shut up!" Archer, in his brief moment of rage, kicked Victor squarely in the chest. Victor stumbled back clutching his chest, and was caught surprised by the blow. It had hurt, but he had dealt with worse. For Victor, this was really just another reason for him to hate Team Rocket.

"You know what?" Archer muttered. "Forget it. I'm DONE for today anyway. Just… I've got better things to do." Stuffing his two Pokéballs into his pockets, he gave up and just walked straight out of the arena.

"Looks like somebody woke up on the wrong side of the bed…" Zekrom remarked. "You OK there, Victor?"

"…Ugh."

"Victor? You OK? You want me to take you to the infirmary?"

"No, Zekrom. I'm fine." Victor sighed. He hesitated to continue, not really wanting to come out with it. But he had already decided Zekrom NEEDED to know. "Listen Zekrom… I need to tell you something."

Zekrom walked up to Victor, sitting next to him curiously. "Well, shoot."

"…Zekrom. You're not going to like this. But you need to know."

Zekrom, getting a bit concerned now, looked at him. "What… what do you mean?"

"Well… just prepare yourself. You WON'T like this."

_"It couldn't be that bad… could it?" _Zekrom thought to himself.

"Tell me." he said. "I can take it."

"…OK. You know when I and Ty went to that cult? The one we were ordered to investigate? We were supposed to bring back blueprints for assimilation technology they had constructed."

"I know. You told me that yesterday. I saw that with Raikou."

"Well… Raikou's not the only one." Victor confessed.

"…He's not the only one? Raikou's not the only one assimilated by that… awful, awful machine?"

"There's something… or rather, someone else."

"…Someone else?" muttered Zekrom. "Well, who is it?"

Victor began to hesitate again, but he couldn't stop now. He had to say who it was. "Someone… someone you know."

Zekrom sat there, thinking for a second. "I know a LOT of Pokémon and people, Victor." he chuckled. "You're going to need to be more precise than that."

Victor stalled again. He knew that saying that one word… just saying that one name… it would shatter Zekrom's soul, and his heart beyond repair. He couldn't back out now.

"…Someone you… love…"

Zekrom looked at him again, taking in his words. He began to think. "…Someone… I…"

* * *

><p>"Hey, Zekrom!"<p>

"Yeah?"

"So, what do you think?"

"Huh?"

"What do you think about the wedding? I mean, what kind of theme should we have?"

"Weddings need themes? I just thought you walked up to the altar, say your vows, and kiss. Does it really need to be more complicated than that?"

"Themes are _vital,_ Zekrom. Nobody's coming to our wedding if we have a horrible theme!"

"Reshiram… it doesn't make any difference. I don't care about the theme. I don't care about the guests; I don't care about the cake!"

"…Then what do you care about?"

"…You."

* * *

><p>"…No." Zekrom whispered. He breathed in and out softly, yet very rapidly. "You can't mean…"<p>

"I… I'm so sorry, Zekrom. I really wish this wasn't true. I really wish it wasn't her."

Zekrom broke down. He shook tremendously as he held himself up from the ground. Tears poured out of his eyes.

"No!" he tried to deny. "No! It-It can't be true! That c-can't b-b-be r-right. No! No! No. No. No…"

He couldn't hold it. Despite his usual good nature, this… had caused his entire world to collapse down on him. Reshiram was the only thing he lived for. She was the one single thing that kept from going insane. She was the only thing that gave him hope. But now…

Now…

…What now?

What was left to live for?

_"Reshiram..."_

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Yep, another chapter update. I like where I'm going with this. And now Zekrom finally knows the truth... Be sure to look for more chapters soon.


	16. How A Nightmare Began

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 16: How a Nightmare Began

* * *

><p>"Well, have you discovered anything?"<p>

"I'm still searching, m'lord."

Two of the Machine Cult members, the leader Xaphan and one of his lackeys Simon, were in a large computer room that the cult had built when they came here. Simon, the technology expert, was furiously flipping through the computer files for anything that could be of use: a link to the Cyber Creator, a link to the Raikou they lost, ANYTHING of use.

"Hmm." Xaphan muttered. "Did Raikou ever get a tracking device install into him?"

"No…" said Simon, stopping his searching for a moment. "At least, not one of OURS."

"…Are you suggesting that he already has one on him?"

"I saw it when I brought him in for conversion, m'lord. I was going to implant ours and remove that one later. 'TR' was on it. I didn't think much of it, because I… well… I didn't expect him to exactly escape."

"But he did, obviously."

"Yeah, but I can't understand why our Cyber Creator would freak out like that when we told him what we were doing with Raikou."

"Hmm. That's not within the character of the One spoken of in the Prophecy. But it must be him. Perhaps some behavior modification chips might be in order…"

"It would be useful." Simon nodded. "After all, my chips and assimilation tech have already proven successful with Reshiram."

Xaphan nodded. "Indeed, I remember how unwilling she was." the lord smirked. "It's amazing what modern technology can do. I can still picture her screaming…"

* * *

><p><em>Flashback<em>

_ 6 years ago_

"Unhand me."

Reshiram couldn't believe it. She had been kidnapped. No, not by your typical 10-year-old Pokémon trainer with a Master Ball. This specific capture had been preordained to happen, and she had not seen it coming. On the morning her wedding was supposed to take place, she had a bomb implanted within her skin and couldn't get it out. At the time, she did not know what the device was and she had rushed to the castle to find Zekrom to get his technical help. He wasn't there. He wasn't anywhere in Unova.

The only living soul Reshiram found there was a stranger she had never met before. He introduced himself as 'a man of caliber and taste, I am Giovanni'. The man told her he could take her to Zekrom. Concluding that she had nothing to lose, she followed him.

Then came the threats. Threats that didn't involve Zekrom, but would affect Reshiram. Giovanni gave her the specifications of the bomb, the type of explosive it was, and its' deadly potential.

"How did you do it without waking me up?"

"Sedatives, of course. It wasn't that difficult." Giovanni said.

He continued. "…If you don't come with me, I will make sure that this spot is your eternal resting place."

And now, here she was. Led by Giovanni at detonation-point, she found herself walking with a despicable man into the Ruins of Alph. She felt so stupid, she didn't see it coming. She couldn't have seen it coming; she didn't know just what KIND of man that stranger was. What kind of monster he truly was.

"I don't think you're in the position for ordering ME around, slave." Giovanni smirked.

Reshiram would have Fusion Flare'd him back, but she wasn't the one holding the true power.

"You know, you could do me the favor of letting me maintain what shreds of dignity I have left…" she snarked.

"…Fair enough." Giovanni let her go. However, Reshiram knew better than to run for it. It was blatantly obvious what Giovanni would do if she attempted to do so. Sighing to herself in disappointment, she walked inside with the man into the Ruins of Alph…

* * *

><p>It was a long, silent excruciating walk. Questions soared through her head about her current predicament. Why did Giovanni bring her to here, the Ruins of Alph? What could be of any potential interest in these abandoned Ruins? And most of all, what was in store for her?<p>

As they walked, Reshiram took notice of the glyphs on the ancient walls. They were Pokémon, though she didn't recognize them, as she had seen none of these Pokémon in the Unova region. However, the further they walked down, the more they… changed.

The same Pokémon started to drastically change appearance, morphing into unnatural… things, with metal screwed into their body. This soon expanded to have weapons grafted onto them. More weapons. More tools. The Pokémon were nothing BUT tools now. High-tech visors. Powerful lasers. Bodies encased almost completely in metal. One of the last ones was one of the most terrifying.

She could barely identify it as a Pokémon. A beast she could hardly define or describe, with attributes of a badger-wolverine. Its' collar made entirely of flames. Those were the only things she could use to know it was a Pokémon. The rest of its' body was a different story. A wire emerged from a metallic pack on the creature's back and into its' head. The right eye glowed with an almost demonic red. Bits and pieces of the creature's chest were grafted in the shining silver substance. A metallic claw substituted for its' right paw. But what that hand held, inside that helmet…

Fear.

Anger.

Hurt.

Sadness.

And…

Regret.

All in the face of the primate in that helmet.

She glanced at Giovanni, who either didn't notice it, or ignored it, as he skipped it while searching the wall for something. His eyes scanned the bricks of the wall carefully, and he pushed a certain sequence of bricks into the wall. The wall seemed to respond, as it turned 90 degrees to reveal a passageway. Reshiram couldn't ignore a haunting feeling of what was behind that wall as Giovanni forced both of them through.

As soon as they made their way through and into a small, dimly lit room, a strange man in a red robe identified them almost immediately.

"Ah, Giovanni. So you have brought her to us." The man took off the hood of his robe, revealing a head of bald hair. "She is in good condition, as I can see. How did you do it?"

"Please. It really wasn't that difficult. I only needed a bomb to make it work. A little bit of planning goes a long way. You have what I requested, correct?"

"But of course." The cultist walked over to a table in the dimly lit room, and pulled off a briefcase. The weight of the briefcase caused it to hit the ground as he pulled it off. Remaining quiet, he handed the briefcase to Giovanni. Giovanni unlocked it and peeked inside.

"1,000,000 dollars?" he questioned, checking the amount.

"Indeed."

Finishing counting up the money, he smirked and closed the suitcase. He also handed a remote-like device to the bald man. "Well, I'll be on my way."

Reshiram growled ferociously as Giovanni. "You're using me as a bargaining chip?"

He turned to the dragon. "I'm an honest man; I'm not going to lie to you. Yes, Reshiram, you are a bargaining chip."

Reshiram said nothing, but still growled menacingly at him.

"I'm curious, though." the cultist told him. "Whatever did you do with the other one?"

Reshiram's eyes widened. _"They couldn't be talking about…?"_

"You only need one, don't you? You paid for one, and that's what I gave you. The other one's with me."

At this point, Reshiram couldn't hold it any longer. She attempted to lash out violently at Giovanni, but this quickly proved to be a mistake.

*beep* *beep* *beep* *beep* Went the spherical device implanted in her neck. She paused briefly.

"I recommend that you behave yourself, Reshiram." the bald man taunted. "We wouldn't want to have to do anything nasty to you, now would we?"

Reluctantly, she backed off, still furious at the both of them.

"Good girl." Giovanni chuckled. "As I said, I must be going now." He took the briefcase filled with money and left the small room, going back the way he came. After he left, two other men in red robes emerged from the opened wall and stood behind Reshiram.

"Come now." the man ordered. He began to walk down a dark hallway and the two men pushed her forward, forcing her to follow. They weren't very gentle, either.

_"I swear…" _she thought angrily to herself. _"If I didn't have a bomb inside me, these guys' asses would be fried by now."_

"All of the other members are already at the laboratory, right?" the bald man, who seemed to be the leader, asked the two men behind Reshiram.

"Yes, m'lord." the two nodded. The bald man also nodded, and Reshiram couldn't help but notice a near demonic look in his eyes.

"Good." he replied. "We'll need everyone to get her in there."

As they continued walking, Reshiram's thoughts turned from infuriating anger to doubtful curiosity. _"I wonder what they're planning to do… whatever it is; I don't think I want to know the answer."_

The seconds seemed to be like hours as Reshiram wondered what they had in order. Whatever it was, she could handle it… right?

…Right?

* * *

><p>"No! Stop!"<p>

"Grab her!"

_Fear. You fear what's coming._

"What are you doing?"

"Don't let her get away!"

_Escape. You try to escape._

"Let me go or I'll…"

"Get her in there!"

"I'd rather die!"

_Rebellion. Better to die than lose your soul._

"I need all 16 of you, come on!"

"What is that thing?"

Clack! Clack! Clack!

"You bastards!"

_Anger. You will never forgive them._

"Just what the hell are you…?"

"Set it up."

Bzzz… Click!

Reshiram's heartbeat buzzed through her ears.

*beep* *beep* *beep*

"Hello Reshiram, how are you today? Welcome to the Cult of the Machine. Rewriting memory…"

"No! No! Help! HELP! LET ME OUT!"

_Desperation. Your last resort. But no one can hear…_

_ …_

_ …_

_ …_

_ "…YeS."_

_ End Flashback_

* * *

><p>"Ah, yes." Xaphan reminisced. "The screams… Anyway, I'm getting distracted. Back to the matter on hand, what did you mean by 'not one of OUR tracking devices'?"<p>

"Oh right, that." Simon muttered. "What I had mentioned is that he already had a tracking device installed on him."

"…You're the technology expert. Can't you hack it and see if we can't use it to track down Raikou?"

Simon smirked. "I think we can assume that it's Team Rocket's, given that their insignia was on there. If I can hack into Team Rocket's database, we could find him and maybe even the Cyber Creator easily."

"Well, what are you waiting for? Get to it! That's an order!"

"Of course, m'lord."

* * *

><p><em>Meanwhile…<em>

"…"

"…"

"…Uhh…"

Inside a dark, small cell somewhere within the Ruins of Alph laid a white, majestic dragon. One that did not belong in there, and one whose mind was not her own.

"…MaS …uhh …nO…"

_Control. You fight for it._

The dragon sat down in the cramped cell as she tried to get a hold on herself. Just last night, she had attacked an Infernape. But she didn't want to. Her body moved on its' own accord.

"sO… sOrrY… I… DiDn'T WisH tHiS."

Her mind was one that she fought constantly for. Even after six years trapped here, she refused to let herself be completely submitted. She still clung onto the small sliver of hope that she could find a way out. But after so long, she was starting to let go of that sliver. Her desperation had almost reached its' breaking point.

"I… MaSTeR… ObEy tHe… nO. nO. nO!" she yelled, her voice synthesized by the helmet. She fought furiously from the inside to prevent her entire soul being lost. "CaN'T… GiVe iN. Z… ZeKRoM… WhErE aRe yOu? WhAt… HaPPeNeD tO yOU?"

"…"

"…"

"…I need you."

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Yep, another chapter. Kind of a smaller filler chapter, but it elaborates on some much needed information. Again, hope you enjoy it. Oh, and for those of you watching me for Pokémon World Tour, don't worry. That's the next one on my agenda! ;)


	17. Chain of Memories

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 17: Chain of Memories

* * *

><p><em>6:30 a.m.<em>

Ethan found himself still snuggling in the comfy bed in the Pokémon Center of Pewter City. The blankets… so soft. The sheets… so warm. The pillow… so… not here? Ethan's eyes widened, knowing something was amiss. Where did it go?

"Ethan!"

POW!

Startled, Ethan jumped out of bed (but after yesterday's incident, he decided to start wearing underpants). Ethan looked around, seeing Lyra with her nightgown on, holding a pillow in her right hand and looking very unhappy.

"What was that for? It's not even daylight out yet!" Ethan shouted furiously, pointing out the window.

Lyra tossed the pillow back onto Ethan's bed. "We have to get going. We have no time to waste if we want to find Raikou and Entei!" She sighed and rolled her eyes, grabbing her clothes and headed into the bathroom to change. Ethan glanced at the clock, realizing the ungodly hour at which Lyra woke him up. He groaned and gritted his teeth.

Sighing in defeat, he grabbed the spare set of clothes he kept in his pack and started to change. He muttered angrily to himself.

"I can beat the Hoenn, Sinnoh, and Unova Champions, but I can't even stand up to Lyra and demand for more sleeping time. Sometimes, I wish I didn't like her so much."

As Ethan put his left shoe on, he stopped for a moment and thought to himself. "Do I even like Lyra in that way?" He grabbed the right shoe and then jammed his foot into it. "Or should I even take that extra step? I don't really… No. I don't really like her that way. Besides, she's dating Silver. But… I do want a child someday, I guess."

Buddy, who was previously asleep, was woken up by Ethan's thought speaking. He didn't show it, but Buddy decided to listen in.

"I mean… I should have a child someday. Because what's the point of becoming a Pokémon Master if I can't pass down my legacy. But Lyra seems pretty happy with Silver, and I don't think Kris is coming back anytime soon."

Kris. The name brought back a lot of memories for Ethan. The blue hair with spiky curved up ponytails, and her spunky determination stuck out in his mind. She was a friend that he had known for a very long time, even longer than Lyra. But Kris was 2 years older than Ethan, and had left for her journey 2 years earlier than Ethan did. The two had lost contact with each other, both of them being so busy with their journeys and they hadn't talked to each other in the longest time.

Ethan sat there for a few moments, with an idea forming in his head. "…I wonder…"

Ethan didn't have Kris' Pokégear number, but he did know her mother's. Ethan sometimes called Kris' mother to ask her if she had seen Kris around, but he didn't have any luck. Kris never liked staying in one place, and always wanted to explore other regions, just like himself. Ethan didn't know what gave him the possible notion that Kris might actually be staying home after her journey, but it surely couldn't hurt to try…

He took out his Pokégear and scrolled down through the list of names and numbers until he reached Kris' mother. Confirming the call, Ethan held the device up to his ear, waiting for the other line.

*ring*

*ring*

*ring*

"Hello?" greeted the other end.

"Uh, hi ma'am." Ethan addressed the elder female.

"Oh Ethan! It's a pleasure to talk to you again."

"This is going to sound silly, but has…"

"Kris come back yet?" her mother finished for Ethan.

Ethan nodded his head, and even though Kris' mother couldn't see it, the woman knew how he felt.

"I'm sorry Ethan, but she still isn't here. I know you've wanted to talk to her, but you know her. Always hunting for adventure. She can't stay in one place."

Ethan sighed. "Yeah. Thanks anyways."

"I'll call you and give you her Pokégear number if she comes back."

"Thank you, ma'am." Ethan hung up, feeling like a fool for even having hope. Realizing this, he shook his head, trying to get his mind back on his goal.

"I can't get sidetracked." he told himself. "First and foremost, we need to find Raikou and Entei."

Lyra came out of the bathroom, fully clothed and ready to leave.

"Are you ready to go, Ethan? We've got a lot of ground to cover."

Ethan nodded. "Yes, don't worry. I'm coming, let's just let Buddy sleep and come back for him afterwards." Ethan stood up from the bed, and went out the door with Lyra, leaving the Feraligatr alone.

* * *

><p><em>7:00 a.m.<em>

"MaSTeR?"

Typhlosion sighed, aggravated. He was just hoping to find Ethan, shoot him with the tranquilizer, and call it a day. The two were at the moment, in New Bark Town, on the border of Johto and Kanto. "Yes, Raikou? And didn't I tell you to quit calling me that?"

"O-oF cOuRSe yOu DiD. I-I JusT hAd A qUeSTioN."

"Then what is it?"

"HoW… dO wE fiND hiM? EtHaN, I mEaN."

Typhlosion stood there briefly, pondering the question. Raikou had a valid point. Typhlosion wasn't sure where Ethan was, or even if he's not off in Hoenn, Sinnoh, or Unova. Giovanni hadn't even told them where Ethan could possibly be.

"Hmm…"

Typhlosion pulled out his internal GPS again. While he did have a handy with him, it wasn't going to tell him where the Champion of Johto would be.

Typhlosion looked at Raikou again. Still covered in cyber armor and upgraded to the max, he wondered if Raikou had any features that might help. As much as Typhlosion didn't want to exploit him, he wasn't left with any other option.

"Raikou?"

"YeS, MaSTeR?"

Typhlosion sighed. "I'm not asking you as your master, or even as your teammate, but as a friend. Could you please sit down for a moment? I need to take a good look at you."

"Of CouRSe, SiR."

As Raikou obeyed, Typhlosion analyzed the electrical beast. Many things were crafted onto the cyber armor forced on Raikou that Typhlosion hadn't noticed before. A red synthetic rubber covered Raikou's fur. Ty assumed the rubber material was to resist against his own electrical attacks that might short-circuit and deactivate the armor. A status screen covered his chest armor, showing vital signs such as current stamina, condition, and power level.

"I don't even have these features." Typhlosion mumbled softly.

Below the status screen were a couple of buttons and a switch. The switch was marked On/Off, leading the fire cyborg to conclude that it controlled the status screen. The four other buttons below the status screen were marked Power Surge, Map, Track, and Log.

"Log?" Typhlosion muttered. Curious, he pushed the button and the status screen switched to the format of a journal log. Typhlosion read its' current state quietly to himself.

XXX

7:17 a.m. – Thursday

Location: New Bark Town

Status: Normal, under control.

Current Objective: Find Ethan, champion of the Johto region. Sedate and bring back to Team Rocket HQ.

Assigned master: Typhlosion

XXX

"…Assigned master…"

"…MaSTeR? ArE yOu oK?"

"…Typhlosion…"

"MaSTeR?"

"…I'm fine." Typhlosion lied. He looked at the log again. This was the current log. He noticed that there are earlier ones, and he decided to flip back to the first one.

XXX

9:02 p.m. – Wednesday

Assimilation 99% complete.

Status: Interrupted. Lock not secured.

XXX

9:12 p.m. – Wednesday

Activation.

Master Typhlosion registered.

Master's friend registered.

XXX

10:11 p.m. – Wednesday

Unknown analysis performed.

"Zekrom's subconscious scanning…" Typhlosion realized.

XXX

11:00 p.m. – Wednesday

Sleep mode activated.

XXX

Typhlosion continued to flip through the log entries. Everything from this morning was in there. From waking up, to registered information that Typhlosion told him about Ethan, and to the assignment Giovanni gave them, all of it was in there.

"…MaSTeR?"

"Yeah? …Oh, right." Typhlosion remembered. Looking at the buttons, Typhlosion hit the Map button. A map of Johto popped up, and their current location of New Bark Town was shown.

"OK. So we're in New Bark Town right now." Ty glanced at the Track Button.

"I wonder…"

After he pressed the second button, the map of Johto was pushed to the left half of the screen and a new window took the right half. It had a similar layout to the Unova model Pokédex, with search, name, height, and location options. Notably, there was a species option with 'Human' among them.

_"Boy…"_ Typhlosion thought to himself. _"These crazies certainly went all out. They really were convinced that I was actually going to join them."_

A search by human name appeared he selected 'Human'. Typing in the name of the Johto Champion on the onscreen keyboard below, he wondered if this thing would really work.

-Searching-

-Searching-

-Searching-

*ding*

Location of Ethan found: Pewter City

"Pewter City…" Ty muttered. "That's where we found the Enigma Stone two days ago."

"MaSTeR…"

"Maybe…." Typhlosion whispered. "Maybe Entei and Suicune are with him."

"MaS… En… tEi… Sui… CuNe… …I kNoW ThEm… FrOm… Uhh… N-N-ArGh!"

Typhlosion flipped to face Raikou, hearing the odd noises.

"Raikou? Is everything all right?"

"EnTEi… ObEy… SUiCuNe… PrOgRAmMiNG… …No… NO!"

Raikou indistinctively grasped the grass with his paws and sunk his claws in. He began to violently convulse.

"RAIKOU!"

He started to uncontrollably regurgitate saliva, and couldn't control his body's shaking. His claws remained in the grass and he shook in place.

"MaS… ObEy… No! No! F-FiGhT iT… Sui… EnTEi… CoNtRoL… SeRvE… No! nO! HeLp… HELP ME!"

Typhlosion wasn't sure of what he could do. He could not get Raikou to snap out of it and stop convulsing. Nothing he could do helped. It was up to Raikou to fight the control.

* * *

><p><em>Raikou's subconscious<em>

"No! YoU DoN't oWn…" he panted heavily, trying to recover himself. "EnTEi… SUiCuNe…" He continued to fight the control that kept trying to erase the memory.

"You have no relationship with Entei." a coaxing voice reassured. "Nothing with Suicune either. Just relax and let me take care of you…"

"nO! m-mY FaMiLY… T-ThEy ArE mY FaMiLY! I LoVe tHeM! YoU-YoU CaN'T tAkE tHeM AwAy fRoM mE!"

The armor of his subconscious self glowed a malevolent purple aura, trying to rule over him.

"No! No! Entei! Suicune!" his normal voice tried to break through. "You are out there! Help me!"

After furiously fighting the mind control, Raikou managed to just temporarily break it and re-obtain his lost memories of Entei and Suicune before it took him over again.

"Don't try that again. Remember your place." the voice told him.

"Ty… TyPhLoSiON iS MaS…"

"Yes…" the voice reassured. "He is. You serve him. And soon, you will serve us."

"No… EnTEi… SuiCuNe… HeLp mE… Please! Help me!"

* * *

><p>Back in the forests surrounding New Bark Town, Typhlosion still watched Raikou convulse. Ty had tried to snap him out of it, but he couldn't. He'd have to wait until Raikou returned to 'normal'. Finally, his claws detached from the grass and he collapsed on the ground, exhausted.<p>

"Raikou? Are you OK? You just had a giant episode!"

"…YeS, M-MaSTeR. UhH… I tHiNk…"

"Yeah? You need any help?"

"No, SiR."

"Oh."

"BuT… I ReMeMbEr tHeM NoW…"

"Them?" Typhlosion asked. "…Do you mean Entei…?"

"AnD SUiCuNe. YeS, MaSTeR. ThEy wErE… tHeY aRe mY FaMiLY. I rEmEmBeR… I MiSS tHeM… I-I LoVe tHeM."

"…Wow."

Typhlosion couldn't help but feel a little better after hearing that. Raikou, though still under control, had finally recovered some of his memories. The ones of Entei and Suicune. The brainwashing influence on Raikou was starting to chip. He had obtained the first memory buried among the chains. If he could obtain enough of them and break the hold, then Zekrom would be able to take the armor off. This was a good sign, and Ty hopefully wished that eventually Raikou would return to normal.

"MaSTeR, tHe ObJeCtiVe." Raikou reminded him.

Typhlosion was snapped out of his hopeful thoughts and remembered what he was supposed to do. He looked at his tranquilizer gun. And as much as he didn't want to do it, he either faced a possible deactivation because of the two strikes already against him, or poisonous drug administration through his metal anklet if he didn't come back.

"Right." Typhlosion sighed. "Let's just get this over with."

* * *

><p>"So, what Pokémon are you going to bring?" Lyra asked.<p>

Inside the Pewter City Pokémon Center, Ethan and Lyra stood in front of the PC. Ethan was trying to figure out if and which 'Mon to withdraw. He wanted a balanced party, but he needed to keep Suicune and Buddy out. Flipping through the organized boxes, he chose Fire-type Arcanine, Bug and Electric-type Galvantula (he had picked one up in Unova), Fighting-type Machamp, and Grass-type Sceptile (the starter he picked when he went to Hoenn).

"…You SURE you want to take Arcanine with you?" Lyra cautioned him. "Buddy hasn't exactly had good memories of the Pokémon."

"Only Nurse Joy's." Ethan pointed out. "Besides, Buddy's probably gotten over it by now."

* * *

><p>Meanwhile…<p>

"Oh God, make it stop!"

Somewhere, in a bathroom inside the Pewter City Pokémon Center, a Feraligatr was receiving swirlies.

Nurse Joy #74's infamous Arcanine was giving everyone's favorite Water Starter a taste of toilet water. The Arcanine laughed evilly as he forced Buddy's head into the toilet and flushed it.

Buddy kept spitting the water out as it reached his mouth. Despite being a Feraligatr, he had a traumatizing fear of Arcanine since he was a Totodile. He tried to whack his powerful tail into the Fire-type, but it barely stunned him.

"When I get out of… *gulp* …ugh… here, I'm gonna freakin' kill you!"

The Arcanine rolled his eyes and flushed the toilet again.

"*glug* *glug* …Please stop it! I can't take it anymore!" Unfortunately, the Arcanine was immune to his desperate pleas of mercy. Buddy had to find a way out of there. Ethan was downstairs and couldn't hear his friend's begging cries. Feeling around with his claw, his left one latched onto Arcanine's neck. Before Arcanine could pull back, Buddy tightly squeezed it, choking him. He used his right arm to pull his head out. Finally escaping, he decided to give the sadistic Arcanine a taste of his own medicine. He forced Arcanine's head into the toilet, and flushed it, making Arcanine ingest the water.

"Ha! Ha! Ha Ha! How does it feel? Is it awful? Torturous? Do you want mercy? Well too bad, you son of a bitch! Now you know the misery I was horrifically scarred with as a Totodile! Ha! Ha! Ha Ha! Ahahahahahaha!"

…Yeah. Buddy's lost it.

* * *

><p>"You REALLY sure about that, Ethan? Buddy's not really a people Pokémon."<p>

Ethan stood there, thinking for a moment. "Uhh… on second thought, never mind."

He thought about withdrawing his Pokémon again, but decided against it, putting Arcanine, Galvantula, Machamp, and Sceptile back.*

"We'll be fine. We're only going to Celadon."

Lyra shrugged her shoulders. "Whatever you say, Ethan…"

Ethan sat back down at a nearby table and peeked at the book in his backpack that he found yesterday.

"You still have that?"

"Yeah. It really bugged me last night. I woke up around 1:00 in the morning to read it. Some of the stuff in there is… kinda scary, actually."

"Like what?"

Ethan scanned the Pokémon Center visually, which was packed to the brim with people.

"I'll tell you on the way to Celadon, OK?"

"…Fair enough, I guess. We should probably go back and get Buddy."

"Yeah. He's probably still asleep in our room."

"Hi there." said a voice behind them.

Ethan and Lyra turned to see the large Feraligatr before them.

"Never mind." Ethan said. "Uh, hi Buddy. You seem to be… really happy today."

"Yep! I couldn't be better!" he claimed happily. "Everything's great! I'm rarin' to go!"

Lyra was a bit suspicious of Buddy's unusually happy mood, but Ethan dismissed it as unimportant.

"All right!" The trio headed out of the Pewter City Pokémon Center and ran onto Route 3. "Next stop, Celadon City!"

* * *

><p>Meanwhile…<p>

"Hmm."

Typhlosion looked at Raikou's map again. The duo had finally reached Pewter City, after Ty was forced to trek an alternate road around Route 27 (a water route).

"Looks like they're on Route 3 now. They're on the way to Cerulean City. I wonder what business they have there."

Typhlosion and Raikou began to walk to Route 3, as Ty recalled the crashed car from two days earlier. On the way there, the duo passed by the crash site, which had finally been cleared up. Most of the large glass shards were gone, and the car had been removed. The window of the Pokémart was still blocked off by precaution tape, but the store was finally open now.

"Maybe I should go over there and buy some supplies…" Typhlosion said. Then he remembered something kind of important. "Right. Pokémon cyborg. Guess that's out, 'cause I don't think I'd be able to explain that one." he chuckled. "Ah well, I guess we'd better get going before we lose Ethan. You ready, Raikou?"

The electric-type nodded. "YeS, oF CouRSe."

The two quickly ran for the entrance to Route 3, planning to catch up with Ethan.

_"EnTEi… SUiCuNe… i'LL FiNd yOu."_

The two reached Route 3 and were following Raikou's map to find Ethan. The duo walked quietly, as Typhlosion didn't want to raise a ruckus and wanted this to go over quickly and efficiently. One dart to the knee and he'd be out for a couple of hours. Definitely more than enough time to get him back to Team Rocket HQ.

The Route wasn't too long, and Ethan was not too far off. As the duo approached closer to them, Typhlosion noticed that they had stopped up ahead.

"Huh? What are they doing? Why'd they stop?"

"Lyra! Come on! We don't have all day!" Ethan groaned as Lyra was jumping up and down on one foot, holding the other in pain.

"But Ethan! I just stubbed my toe against a pointy rock! And it's bleeding!"

"Big whoop!" Ethan shouted sarcastically. "I've been scorched by Fire Pokémon, electrocuted by Electric Pokémon, and God only knows how many times Buddy has chomped on me with those crocodile jaws!"

"I was teething!" the crocodile tried to justify.

"And you have to nerve to gripe to me about a stubbed toe?" Ethan crossed his arms.

"…I hate you." Lyra muttered as she painfully put her foot down. "You know that, right?"

"Oh believe me." Ethan smirked. "I know it."

Lyra fumed at Ethan as he stood there smirking. "Why, you little…!"

Suicune rolled her eyes as the two quarreled. "Humans. Honestly, how did they survive as a species for this long?"

"Yeah." Buddy agreed as Lyra began to take out pepper spray from her bag. "You do have to question why some humans are such idiots."

"OH! My eyes! They sting! They burn! They burn horribly and painfully!" Ethan quickly took out a water bottle and poured the entire bottle out and onto his eyes. He sighed in relief as the water doused his eyes, and removed most of the sting. "Oh, oh, sweet relief! Thank you, God, Jesus, Buddha, and Morgan Freeman, you know who you are!"

Lyra couldn't help but laugh louder than the average Exploud. "Ahahahahaha! Oh my gosh, you're priceless Ethan! Ahahahaha!"

Ethan turned to angrily face Lyra. "I hate you!"

"Oh believe me." Lyra smirked. "I know it."

"Humans…" sighed Typhlosion as he watched the events unfold from a safe distance. "Seriously, how stupid can they get?"

"ApPaReNtLy, VeRy MuCh sO, MaSTeR." Raikou replied in as much deadpan as his synthesized robotic voice could deliver.

Typhlosion chuckled. "Heh. Yeah." Then Typhlosion realized something Raikou just did. Deliver sarcasm. As minor as it seemed, it was part of Raikou's original personality coming back. And to Ty, deadpan snarker brainwashed Raikou was better than unquestioning servant brainwashed Raikou. At least it was another step forward.

"sO… wHaT nOw, MaSTeR?"

"Well… I don't want us to get seen. I think we should…"

"MaSTeR? mAy I POiNt sOmEThiNG oUT?"

"Uhh… sure, feel free."

"…SUiCuNe iS WiTh hiM."

Typhlosion was slightly startled to hear this, and checked again. Sure enough, the Beast of Water was with Ethan, and facing away from them.

"Oh boy." Typhlosion muttered. "This presents a new problem. If she sees you, she's gonna freak."

"…"

"Raikou? Raikou!" Typhlosion realized that Raikou was making a mad dash for them. "Raikou, get back here!" he yelled, trying to catch Raikou's attention.

"…YeS, MaSTeR." he said as he retreated to him.

And while Typhlosion's yelling caught Raikou's attention… it caught the attention of Ethan, Lyra, Buddy, and Suicune, as well.

All four of them turned around to see two Pokémon. A Typhlosion and…

"Raikou!" Suicune shouted in joy. She quickly ran for him, running faster than she had ever run before. Suicune happily tackled Raikou, the two tumbling around in the grass until they stopped with Raikou over Suicune. Once her rush wore off, Suicune stopped and noticed how Raikou had… changed.

Suicune panted, looking over Raikou in fear. EVERYTHING had changed. Sleek cyber armor covered his fur, and over his torso, legs, and head. His fun, snarky personality was absent. And his eyes… inside a helmet were his dull, lifeless eyes and appeared to be stuck in a trance.

"Raikou?" she asked. "What happened to you?"

"…" Raikou did not respond.

"Raikou!" Typhlosion shouted, running towards him. "Get off of her!"

Raikou sighed, obeying his ruler. "YeS, MaSTeR."

Suicune was even more stunned by Raikou's voice change. Instead of embodying fun and freedom, it was cold. Robotic. Lifeless.

"Master?" Suicune wondered in confusion. She stood up from the ground, and got a good look at who Raikou called 'Master'.

"…"

_"It's him." _Suicune realized. _"That Typhlosion. That cyborg. The one in the Pewter City Museum footage. The one who helped steal the Enigma Stone. But… Raikou wasn't like that. Not when I first saw him. And not in the footage either. Did… did he… d-do this? To my own brother?"_

"Suicune!" Ethan, Lyra, and Buddy ran up to her. "What's going on?"

Suicune grit her teeth. She faced Typhlosion. "He's what's going on! He's why Raikou is… just look."

The three looked at Raikou. All three were astonished at what their eyes saw.

"What the…!" Ethan exclaimed.

"How on Earth…!" Lyra shouted.

"…What kind of sick monster would do this?" Buddy yelled.

"Ask him." Suicune said coldly, motioning to Typhlosion.

Typhlosion's eyes widened in fear. Things weren't looking good for him. They were not happy at all, and they were just about ready to kill him.

"Umm…" Typhlosion mumbled nervously. "I-I can e-explain."

"Yeah! Sure you can, you conniving, heartless bastard!" Buddy screamed. He ran towards Typhlosion at top speed using all fours, and attempted to go a step far than fainting him. He was going for the kill.

"No! Wait!" he tried to defend himself. He tried to run, but Buddy was significantly faster, being powered by adrenaline. Within a few seconds, the water crocodile had caught up to him.

"Say good night!" Buddy grit his teeth. He sent out a Water move to take the advantage, using Aqua Tail. He whipped his tail surrounded by spirals of water onto Typhlosion. Directly hitting, it sent Typhlosion back a distance and he collided with the ground. Unfortunately for the cyborg, the water had sunk into his metal parts, and messed around with his circuits. He soon found himself unable to move, and stuck lying in the grass, helpless.

Buddy ran up to Typhlosion, grabbed the immobile creature by the neck and clawed him, with blood bursting from the organic half of the cyborg's chest.

"No! Please stop!" he protested. "I didn't do that to him! I didn't want that to happen!"

"You ARE evil! I knew it! I was willing to give you a second chance, but then you did THIS to Raikou! You turned him into a heartless machine! You turned him into a heartless, soulless, vile machine JUST LIKE YOU!"

And unlike a typical Pokémon battle, Buddy held nothing back, and was fully focused on the kill. Buddy threw him against a tree, knocking the wind out of Typhlosion and coating the tree in blood. His metal parts had been dented from the throw. Left completely helpless, Typhlosion knew this would be his untimely demise.

Then Raikou stepped in between the two. He wasn't going to allow this to continue any longer.

"If yOu wAnT mY MaSTeR…" he said coldly. "YoU wiLL HaVe tO gO ThRouGH mE."

"No." Typhlosion told him. "Get out of the way. You can't protect me."

"…BuT, MaSTeR." Raikou protested. "YoU ArE iMMobiLE. ThE FeRALigAtR sTiLL pReSeNTs a cReDibLE ThReAt. PLeaSe LeT mE…"

"I said no, Raikou!" Typhlosion yelled. "Now get out of the way!"

"…YeS, MaSTeR." Raikou backed off to the side, next to Suicune. She looked over her brainwashed brother desperately.

"Raikou? What happened to you? Who did this to you?"

"…SUiCuNe…"

"Yes?"

"…PLeAsE… PLeAsE dOn'T LeT hiM KiLL MaS-… TyPhLoSioN."

"But he did this to you, didn't he?" Suicune shouted. "Why shouldn't we?"

"…PLeAsE… aS… yOUr BrOtHeR… I pLeAd yOu. SpArE hiM. hE diDN't dO… tHiS."

"What! Then who DID?"

"You know…" Buddy said to the injured Typhlosion, ignoring the conversation. "There's nothing more I despise than beings like you. Beings who take advantage of others like that. You brainwash them. Force them to think another way. Have them follow your every whim. There's nothing more evil than that. Nothing."

"…It wasn't me." Typhlosion tried to defend himself. "It was that wacko cult, the one who wanted to cyborgify Pokémon and do what you just said. Not me. I didn't want this."

"Cult? The hell you are talking…?"

_"To rid the universe of all mortals inferior…" _

_ "To repair the galaxies with machine superior…"_

_ "And to have obedience instilled with fear…"_

_ "What a wonderful world it would be…"_

"…That crazy limerick… the one Ethan found…"

Typhlosion began to pant, unable to support himself for much longer. He was starting to wear, and was on the verge of collapse.

"It wasn't me." Typhlosion said again. "It was them. They made him that way! They think I'm their chosen one! And I think they're crazy! And whatever you do… help me… just get Raikou back to normal…"

Buddy looked at Typhlosion again, this time with caring and understanding rather than rage and anger. Typhlosion only smiled with hope as he finally collapsed, unconscious.

"…"

"…"

"…"

"…"

"…"

All five of the others were silent. The route became uncomfortably quiet.

"So…" Ethan muttered. "What I read in that book was true…"

Lyra broke the silence again. "…Cerulean City's close by. We can get him to the Pokémon Center."

"…"

"…Ethan?"

"…Right. Come on, let's go."

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Huzzah! An update! Sorry for the wait, but I wanted to deliver a lengthy high-quality chapter! And here it is! And for me, school is finally out for the summer! And as always, Read & Review!


	18. The Second Encounter

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 18: The Second Encounter

* * *

><p>"So, where do we start?"<p>

After a good night's sleep, Entei and Alakazam were feeling great and ready to go. The night before, they had reached Fuchsia City via Route 17 (the biking route) to stay. They had stayed the night in an alleyway to avoid being seen by human eyes. For Alakazam, it wouldn't have been a big deal, but it's not a very wise decision for a Legendary Pokémon to expose himself and risk getting caught… again.

"I'm… not sure." Alakazam told the Fire type. "Raikou and Suicune are your counterparts, aren't they? Shouldn't you know? I mean-"

"Yes, I should totally know where my siblings are after being knocked unconscious by a man with some serious mental problems!" Entei replied with heavy sarcasm.

Alakazam didn't respond. He remained silent and still for a few seconds, making Entei feel awkward.

"Oh… right." he muttered, forgetting the bond that Alakazam and Eusine once held. "Sorry."

Alakazam still stood there, thinking about how his master's obsession with Suicune had damaged their relationship. As insensitive as it was for Entei to comment like that… Alakazam could kind of agree with him. His friendship with Eusine was severed because of his inability to focus on almost anything but Suicune… including his own Pokémon. Alakazam has, or perhaps had, a special friendship with his master. The two saw each other in an equal light. Human and Pokémon, side by side, with a mission to accomplish their goal. Meet Suicune.

But things got worse. Alakazam could put up with his new eccentric behavior, since on the inside; he was still the same hopeful boy. But then neglect began to happen. Oh sure, Eusine would remember on occasion, but more often than not he would spend hours trying to track Suicune, leaving Alakazam to train by himself. But he easily put up with it.

However, the last straw came when Eusine had announced his plans to capture Suicune. He had even stolen a Master Ball from Silph Co. in Saffron City to do this. Before, Eusine had only wanted to meet the creature face to face. Now, he wanted to capture it. Alakazam might not have objected so much if Eusine would still let Suicune have her freedom. Any good trainer would respect the freedom such a magnificent beast wanted. But Eusine didn't want Suicune to leave his sight ever again. He had planned to keep Suicune locked up in his house for as long as she would live.

And Alakazam wouldn't stand for that. He tried to dissuade him, but even the opinion of his first Pokémon had no effect. Eusine was still dead-set on doing this. Eusine had recalled Alakazam to avoid hearing any further protests.

Entei looked over Alakazam, who had been silent for around 5 minutes. "Alakazam?"

"I tried to stop him." Alakazam spoke verbally. Entei seemed surprised at the reaction. "Really, I did. Even I knew that such a magnificent beast should have her say. And I knew Eusine wouldn't allow that. But then of course, the mix-up happened…"

"Well…" Entei muttered. "Thanks for trying."

"All I want is the old Eusine back."

Entei smiled, setting a paw on Alakazam's shoulder. Entei pulled closer and hugged him, surprising Alakazam. "I promise, Alakazam. You helped me get out of there. As soon as we get this mess straightened out, I'll do my best to get Suicune to meet you guys in person."

"…Thank you."

The two let go of each other, and their minds drifted back to their next plan.

"So, what now?" Entei asked.

"Think, Entei." Alakazam said. "If you don't know where Suicune could be, then what about Raikou? You told me he went missing. Surely, you must have at least an idea of where he could be?"

"Well…" he muttered. "It could just be my paranoia and grudge speaking, but…"

"Yes?"

"I wouldn't hold this to be above Team Rocket."

"That's no surprise." Alakazam said. "They'll stoop to any level. Still, you really think they did it? Do they even have the capability to capture a Legendary?"

"It's all we have to go on, isn't it? We might as well try. And if I know my brother, he probably did something stupid enough to let himself get caught in the first place!"

Alakazam chuckled. "You two were close, weren't you?"

"Yes, we were. I wish I had never fought with him. Then, I wouldn't even be on this crazy chase!"

Alakazam looked at him. "That's how this got started? Because you had a fight with your brother? What was it about?"

Entei sighed. "In retrospect, something very petty and stupid."

"…I think that's all I need to know." Alakazam answered. "But back to the point; I think you're right. It wouldn't be a bad idea to investigate Team Rocket."

"Sounds good. But there's a problem with that. We're in Kanto right now. Their current base, if it's even still there, is somewhere under Mahogany Town. Which is in Johto. It would take us days to walk there."

"Who said we were walking?"

"Then what do you suggest we do, fly?" he remarked sarcastically.

"Entei, you might have forgotten, but I am a Psychic-type. I can teleport us there. Well, not exactly Mahogany Town, since I can only teleport to places I've been and I've never actually been in Mahogany Town. Ecruteak City is the closest place I can teleport to."

"You've been to Ecruteak?"

"Yeah, Eusine often visits Morty, the Ghost-type Gym Leader there. The two are pretty buddy-buddy. Well, they were at least. Eusine hasn't visited him in almost a year. I don't think I need to explain why."

"So… how does this teleporting thing work?"

"Just hold onto my hand. Well, three-fingered hand-things but you get the point. I'll get us there."

"Is there anything else I should know?" Entei asked, curious about side effects.

"Well… new timers to teleporting can get a little nauseous, but it's nothing that can't be handled."

"…Whatever you say…" Entei said as he grabbed Alakazam's hand. The Psychic Pokémon closed his eyes and began to focus. His body lit up pink, and so did Entei's, both of them ready to teleport. The two slightly levitated into the air and then quickly vanished.

* * *

><p>Almost immediately after they vanished, Entei and Alakazam found themselves traveling through an odd dimension at what Entei thought was the speed of light. Both of their feet were only a few inches from the ground as they floated through the place. Looking around, he spotted surreal landscapes with explosions of pink in the sky. The ground they levitated over warped itself to accommodate a path for the two Pokémon. Entei wondered if this was truly real, or if he was just having a massive acid trip.<p>

"This is normal, right?"Entei asked Alakazam, who was leading the way.

"Yes, this is the realm that Pokémon travel to between their teleport locations. I could spend all day explaining how it works, but in layman's terms, it connects the two locations and a teleporting Pokémon can quickly find their way through to where they want to go."

Entei looked below his feet. He quickly noticed that they were started to ascend higher and higher into the air. They eventually ascended high above Kanto and Johto. He started to become apprehensive about following Alakazam, wondering if he really knew anything about this place but in the end, Entei decided to trust him. Considering Alakazam had saved him from spending the rest of his life with Eusine, his sense of honor made him obligated to return the favor.

Looking down, Entei saw himself and Alakazam floating over Mt. Silver. The mountain itself was still as gorgeous as ever in this odd realm, with the pink aura from the skies causing the mountain to bask in it, resulting in a magnificent wonder to behold. As the two went over the summit of the mountain, Entei could have sworn he saw the shadow of a being…

"Nah, my imagination's playing tricks on me."

* * *

><p>The two started to descend until they hit what appeared to be Ecruteak City. They maneuvered through until Alakazam stopped at where he was with Entei right behind him.<p>

Entei checked his surroundings again. The two stood close to what Entei identified as the Bell Tower. Except not. What was the inside of the Bell Tower was now the outside, and what was the outside could not be seen now. The inner workings of the Bell Tower now functioned outside of it, with the gears and mechanisms clearly visible as they held the top of the tower. Oddly enough, the top of the tower looked to be the same as it was back into Ecruteak.

Looking behind himself, his jaw almost dropped out of his mouth when he saw a waterfall. Now, a waterfall is something that is natural. Usually. However, here a waterfall started in mid-air, with no visible water source and the water didn't even crash into the ground. It just evaporated mid-air as it approached the bottom. It violated so many laws of physics at once, that Einstein would have had an absolute field day.

"This is the most messed-up place I've ever seen." Entei stated. "Who made it, M. C. Escher?"

"That's typically what first-time teleporters say. Or something along those lines." Alakazam chuckled. "This world is very unlike ours, Entei. It exists as an equal balance for our world. What I've observed is that physics here don't follow ours. Or physics might not even exist here. There could be other worlds like this out there, but I don't really know. Anyway, that's not important right now. What's important is that from here, we head back to the real world."

"…I get the feeling that this is going to be via some convoluted, crazy method that I'd never figure out in a million years." Entei said.

Alakazam chuckled. "Not really. It's simpler than you think." At that point, Alakazam waved his hand over the ground and a portal generated.

"I've set the portal to take us just outside Ecruteak City, on Route 42. It's the closest place I can get us to. All we have to do is jump in and then make our way through Mt. Mortar and to Mahogany Town."

"…"

"Entei?"

"I gotta say… this is definitely among the weirdest things that I've ever seen in my life. A world that is the opposite from ours, with distorted physics. I'm still wondering if I'm just hallucinating. But I trust you."

Alakazam nodded. "All right, then. Ladies first." Entei quickly hopped in, putting all of his faith in Alakazam. Then, his eyes widened as he had just realized what Alakazam said.

"Hey!"

Alakazam smirked. He hopped in right after Entei, and sealed the portal behind him.

* * *

><p>"Get back here, Zekrom! At least let me talk to you!"<p>

Zekrom didn't want to listen. There wasn't time. He knew he needed to hurry and get to the Ruins of Alph as fast as he possibly could.

Blindly running into the caves of Mt. Mortar, he tried to find his way through. He quickly found himself shrouded in darkness as he attempted to feel his way around the cave. However, he had lost his pursuer.

"Crap." he muttered. He put his hand against the left cave wall to continue, hoping it would eventually lead to a way out. He followed the path through twists and turns, stumbling over a few cave rocks as he went. Near the end, he found a light, which he sincerely prayed was daylight. He continued slowly, not wanting to trip over any more rocks.

As he got closer, he realized it was not daylight, but light provided by a fire seemingly floating in the air. Zekrom simply attempted to walk around it until he caused a nearby stalagmite to break, creating a large shatter. Said fire shifted and grabbed him with… an arm?

"Zekrom, I know you don't want to listen to me, but… let me explain myself."

Zekrom sighed, somewhat in relief and disappointment as he realized it was Victor, who had pursued him from Mahogany Town.

"What is there to explain, Victor?" he said. "You already did. It doesn't change what happened."

"I know it doesn't, but you can't just go running off like that! If Team Rocket finds out…"

"I DON'T CARE!" Zekrom suddenly screamed, his patience having evaporated. "I don't care if they find me, drug me, or cyborgify me! I don't care what the hell they do! All I want is to see Reshiram one more damn time until I die! I know where she is now! And I'M! NOT! WAITING!"

Victor covered his ears as Zekrom's scream reverberated from the walls. A tense silence filled the air as the scream faded away.

"…Zekrom. I'm not going to lie to you and say I know what it's like to lose someone you love, because I don't. I was taken from my family before my egg even hatched. So no, maybe I don't know what it's like to lose a love. …But I do know what it's like to lose a friend."

"…That's different. He wasn't taken from you. He survived."

"I didn't know he would. I was convinced that he was dead. You remember that day, right? That day when his teammate brought him in, his body completely fried?" Victor started to walk through the cave, with Zekrom following.

"…Yes. Yes, I do. You didn't have an assignment with him that time."

"That's true. But… you know, when he went into surgery… I was doubtful that he would survive. After all, those cybernetics didn't have a perfect chance of working. There was always the possibility that his body would reject them. I guess my point is that I don't know what it's like to lose your love. But, I guess to a certain degree, I understand what you're going through. You know, you really should have let me talk to you BEFORE we both got lost in Mt. Mortar."

"Hey! Don't blame me! I thought you were going to drag me back to HQ! …Are you still planning to do that? Because I will NOT go back."

Victor nodded, though it was difficult to see in the dark cave. "I understand. I wasn't trying to force you back. But if Team Rocket catches us, the consequences aren't going to be pretty."

"…Us? Wait… So, you want to come with me?"

"There's not exactly much to leave behind."

"But then, what are you going to do once I get to Reshiram?"

"Will you even be able to free-"

"Most likely not." Zekrom stated rather matter-of-factly. "But, if what you say is true… then brainwashed or not, I WILL see her one last time."

Victor stopped. "Then what will you do if they've managed to wipe her entire memory? She may not even know who you are anymore."

"I might be able to re-activate any lost memories, provided that she has somehow managed to preserve them. If she can no longer remember me or anything else prior to that day six years ago… if her entire self is gone… then I will kill her. And everyone else in that cult. Everyone. No exceptions."

Zekrom's tone was cold. Victor didn't feel the need to question Zekrom any further about his agenda after that. The two remained silent throughout the rest of the way through Mt. Mortar.

* * *

><p>The two, after several minutes of walking, found their way out of the mountain. They emerged on Route 42, near Ecruteak City. Victor had decided to come with Zekrom, since there wasn't anything left for him at Team Rocket. Eventually though, Team Rocket would realize that both of them were missing. It was just a matter of time. Of course, on the off chance that even if Team Rocket didn't realize what happened, the drugs inside of their metal anklets would activate if they weren't back at HQ at midnight. The substance is a slow murderer, taking several hours but guarantees death if not treated. The only known antidote was at back at the base at Mahogany Town. But the prospect of death didn't seem to bug Zekrom at this point, since he had been informed that his only reason and hope for living was gone.<p>

"So, how exactly do we get to the Ruins of Alph?" asked Zekrom. "I've spent most of my time here creating inventions for Team Rocket, so I don't exactly know the lay of the land very well…"

Victor, who had been there before, explained it to him. "We'll have to head through Ecruteak, and then head south-east towards Violet City. The entrance to the Ruins is just outside of Violet. Though last time, we headed AROUND the city…"

Zekrom nodded. There wasn't much left to do except to get going. The two were just about to enter Ecruteak City, when a portal unexpectedly opened above them. Victor looked up to see two Pokémon dropping out and with his quick reflexes; he leapt out of the way just in time. Zekrom, however, wasn't as nimble.

"Oof!" he yelled as he was forced to the ground by the unexpected weight of two Pokémon.

"Sorry about that." one of the Pokémon, an Alakazam, apologized. He and the other Pokémon got off of Zekrom as the dragon stood himself up again.

"Watch where you're going, would you?" he growled. He dusted the dirt off that clung to him when he fell. "Who are you two, anyways?"

"Well, I suppose we could spare some time for introductions." Alakazam muttered. "I'm… well, you know, an Alakazam." He motioned towards the Legendary Beast. "And he's…"

"Entei." he nodded. "I can introduce myself just fine, Alakazam."

"I was just being polite." Alakazam shrugged.

"Wait a second…" muttered Victor, who had now approached the group. "How did you two do that… portal thing?"

"Victor, we don't have time for this!" reminded Zekrom. "We need to get going!"

"Hey Zekrom, I'm just wondering!"

"That was teleporting. I needed to teleport Entei and myself here." Alakazam explained.

"Enough about that." Entei interrupted. "We told you who we were. Now, I think it's only fair if you tell us who you are."

Victor sighed. "…Do you really want to know?"

Zekrom glared at Victor. "Bushes. You and me. Now."

The two walked over to some secluded bushes a distance away. Alakazam and Entei were left somewhat confused, but decided to wait it out.

"Are you crazy?" Zekrom harshly whisper-shouted into Victor's ear. "You can't tell them who we are! Why on earth would you want to tell a pair of strangers who we are, anyways?"

Victor groaned. "Zekrom."

"Yes?"

"Take a good look at him. Not Alakazam. I mean the Legendary Beast."

"…You mean Entei?"

"Exactly. I don't know if you're familiar with the Legends associated with Johto, but Raikou, Entei and Suicune are all part of a trio. Their role is to help protect the region. And judging from what little I know, they'd do anything for each other."

"…Your point being?"

Victor groaned. "My point is that if Entei knows that Raikou was captured by Team Rocket, then he's probably heading for HQ right now!"

"…Oh crap."

"The thing is, I don't think they realize how dangerous it is to attempt something like that."

"…So, then. Victor? What do you propose we do?"

"…This is a long shot." Victor muttered. "But…"

"I'm listening."

"First off, we come out and explain everything to them. The cult brainwashing Raikou, about us being from Team Rocket, and the fact that we're escapees."

"And if they decide to attack us?"

"Raikou still needs a family to go back to. So we won't kill them, even though you and I are more than capable of doing that. We'll just knock them unconscious. But only if the situation gets really bad and only if."

"So, assume everything goes well. Then where do we go?"

"I'll try to convince them to go to the Ruins of Alph. Telling Entei that cult brainwashed his brother will get him riled up enough to want to take revenge. Plus, Raikou isn't even at HQ. There's no point in them going there. But we don't have much time. We need to do this in less than a day. And, I guess whether you like it or not, we'll have to go back once we're done. Otherwise… well, you know…"

"…Yeah."

"I can only pray that they don't discover that we took a fake mission."

"…You did what?" Zekrom said, surprised.

"Why do you think they're not here yet? I grabbed a mission slot so that they would think that we were on an assignment. That gives us until midnight."

"…All right, then." Zekrom muttered. "So, we're going through with this?"

Victor nodded.

"Then let's do it."

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Drama bomb. Anyway, I didn't really know how to end this chapter, so I went with this. I know I am getting bad with my updates. Still, I have a drive to finish it, and I hope you can see me through!


	19. Silhouette

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 19: Silhouette

* * *

><p>"How much farther until we hit Cerulean City?"<p>

"Stop asking me, Lyra!"

Things weren't going very well for our hero Ethan as he ran as quickly as he could to Cerulean, holding a Typhlosion. Finding Raikou was a big enough deal as it was, but being 'commanded' by a Typhlosion that was a cyborg? Reflecting upon what had happened minutes before, it all did seem too crazy to even be remotely believable. Maybe it was all just an insane dream caused by too much Berry Juice the night before?

"Then again," he thought to himself. "I do live in a universe where monsters control time and space. A Cyborg Pokémon probably isn't too much of a stretch."

Suicune closely followed behind Ethan, also trying to take in the events that transpired as she ran by Raikou's side.

"It's so… odd." Suicune thought. "Seeing Raikou like… this. And not complaining or moaning and groaning."

She looked at him, running diligently with a pale, emotionless expression on his face under the helmet.

"…It's just not right." she said aloud. "There must be some way to change him back to normal."

"Suicune, can we discuss this later?" asked Ethan. "We're approaching Cerulean City and I need to get this Typhlosion to the Pokémon Center A.S.A.P.!"

"…All right." she muttered.

Buddy also couldn't help but ponder what had happened as they entered the city.

_"Was that… inhuman beast actually telling the truth?" _he briefly mused. _"Maybe… no. That can't be. I saw him robbing Pewter Museum in the security footage. Something tells me that he's part of that demented cult, and he's gonna have some questions to answer when he wakes up… that is, IF he wakes up."_

The entire group ran into the Pokémon Center. They had caught the attention of everyone there, including the Nurse Joy, who immediately took notice of Typhlosion's critical condition. His eyes had rolled over, the natural one to white and the robotic one to the grayish metal. Copious amounts of blood ran out of Typhlosion's open mouth, as well as even larger amounts of the substance from deep, long gashes in his skin. She was initially very surprised by his cyborg parts, but she quickly put it aside, knowing that he needed aid IMMEDIATELY. She took the large Typhlosion from Ethan, who was inwardly impressed with her strength, and the ease she had in quickly carting him off to the emergency room.

All that was left to do was wait.

* * *

><p>The quintet of Ethan, Lyra, Buddy, Raikou and Suicune were all left waiting to hear on Typhlosion's condition.<p>

Buddy said meekly to himself, "Maybe I went a little too far."

Ethan talked back to him. "Really? You attacked him and might have even killed him without my command. Buddy, you realize that if he dies… you could be put to death for murder."

Buddy's eyes widened at this realization. When fighting, Pokémon are supposed to hold back a portion of their power. All tamed Pokémon are taught this when they are captured or hatched. However, when the Feraligatr had confronted the Typhlosion, Buddy had been furious. He had not held any of his tremendous power back. And if Typhlosion died as a result, he could be put to death himself for murdering a Pokémon. Now more than ever before, Buddy sincerely hoped that Typhlosion would live to tell his tale.

The minutes ticked by slowly, with every second seeming like an hour. Buddy bit his lips as time passed, while Raikou showed genuine concern for his 'master'.

"Oh, PLeAsE MaSTeR." he whispered. "bE oK. PLeAsE, PLeAsE, PLeAsE, PLeAsE…"

Suicune studied Raikou as he whispered in worry to himself. _"Why? Why is he so worried about this Typhlosion? …It has to be the brainwashing, right?" _she thought. _"Unless he's more than just a master to him…"_

The concern in his voice, despite being robotic in tone, truly sounded in worry about Typhlosion. It sounded as if he was scared of not losing a 'master'… but losing a friend.

Suicune also found herself hoping that the Typhlosion would wake up, so that he could provide an explanation to all of this.

"Excuse me, Mr. Ethan?"

One of the Nurse Joys came back through the same double doors Typhlosion had been rushed through a few hours earlier. Ethan stood up to speak up her.

"Yes, Nurse Joy?"

"…It was not easy, since we were not familiar with his… parts. However, he has been bandaged up, and he made it out OK after we treated the severe scars and cleaned up the excess blood."

Buddy breathed a sigh of relief, thankful that he wouldn't be convicted of murder.

"Where is he right now?" Ethan asked.

"He's in his room resting. I'll take you back to him, just don't be too loud."

The Nurse Joy walked back through the double doors as the quintet followed. She led them to a door in the back of the Pokémon Center, presumably the patient's room.

* * *

><p>"Ugh… my whole body is throbbing in pain…"<p>

"Mr. Typhlosion?"

Typhlosion slowly drifted back into consciousness. He tried to open his eyes to analyze his surroundings, but his eyelids were the weight of two Snorlaxes at that moment. He tried to get up, but the weight of his body along with his weakened condition prevented that. He could move both his paw and claw just fine, though. He had heard Nurse Joy clearly and was able to articulate speech.

"Yes?"

"You have visitors."

He seemed surprised at this. _"How would I have visitors?" _he thought. _"Did Victor take me back to the base? But… that was a Nurse Joy, and they don't have them at HQ."_

He paused for a moment. _"Wait… if I'm not at HQ, and if there's a Nurse Joy here… then I must be at a Pokémon Center, right? Who took me in?"_

"Mr. Typhlosion?" the nurse said again.

"…Let them come in." he said. He wanted to see these visitors for himself… once his eyes decided to start working, that is. As soon as he said that, he heard footsteps walked in and surround his bed. Typhlosion tried to open his heavy eyes again, and this time managed to get his robotic one open, with the natural one still shut. For Ethan and company, it was a rather awkward and unnatural sight. But that needed to be pushed to the side at the moment.

"This room…" Typhlosion muttered. "I…I-I'm in a Pokémon Center, right?"

He looked over the room with his one eye open. Everyone in the room was looking at him, making him feel a bit uncomfortable. He recognized the Feraligatr in the room as the one who had beat him up before. Looking at him now, when he was calm and staring at him… it was arguably worse than when he was getting pummeled by the crocodile. The Feraligatr's look in his eyes seemed to fear retribution for what he had done. It was almost as if the Feraligatr expected him to whip out some sort of laser cannon from his pack and fry him at any second. He feared him. And the one thing Typhlosion didn't like was people fearing him.

"Uh, yes." Ethan said, uneasily breaking the silence. "After… Mr. Chompy over there decided to beat up rather violently on you; I and my party took you to the nearest Pokémon Center in Cerulean City."

"…Oh." was all Typhlosion said.

"…I have a few questions I'd like to ask you." said Suicune with a dissatisfied tone in her voice.

Typhlosion sighed. "It only figures you'd have questions, given the state you saw Raikou in. Fire away."

Suicune seemed somewhat surprised by the cyborg's calm demeanor, but went ahead with her question.

"…What exactly did you do to Raikou?" she asked with contempt in her voice. Raikou's expression was soulless as she motioned to him.

"…It's not something I did. I-I was trying to explain that before I collapsed."

"…Raikou… did tell me something about that before Buddy attacked you." Suicune admitted.

"He did?" muttered Typhlosion. "Well… he's right. I didn't do that to him. I didn't WANT that to happen to him."

"Then just who did?" Suicune further interrogated.

"…He told me some of it, after I… pummeled him." Buddy confessed.

Everyone looked over at Buddy. "We know THAT." Ethan said. "But is it true? This cult you were talking about… they truly did do it?"

"…Yes. They did. They think I'm their God. Supposedly, I'm destined to be the 'Cyber Creator' or something like that and help them take over the world. But I want no part in it."

"How could something like this even be possible?" Suicune wondered. "How could they even do it?"

"…I can tell you what I know so far about it. I probably owe you guys for saving my life."

"Then let's hear it." Buddy ordered him, finally speaking up.

"Well, for starters, I work for Team Rocket. Raikou, Victor, and I…"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Back up a minute there." Ethan said. "You work for Team Rocket?"

"…Yes."

"Then why should we trust you?" Buddy asked suspiciously.

"…Because I don't willingly work for them. I don't WANT to work for them. They captured me as a Cyndaquil and took me from a trainer starting on his journey. I can't remember who he was."

Ethan thought about this for a moment. He recalled having a Cyndaquil before it disappeared on him one day. In fact, he had talked about it with Buddy back at Viridian City just a few days ago.

"But that's irrelevant right now." Typhlosion continued. "I was brought up by Team Rocket since I was young. Raikou was just the most recent addition to the 'team'. We are routinely given assignments, whether it be to capture Pokémon for the team, or…assassinate someone."

No one was surprised at this revelation. All of them knew that Team Rocket was evil, and sinking low was nothing new for them.

"…But that still doesn't explain how you found out about this cult or how you became… this. Did that cult do this to you too?" Lyra wondered.

"No. Team Rocket did this to me. But it was actually to save my life after I suffered from a… rather unfortunate accident as a Quilava. I've had to learn to accept this as part of me, because there's nothing I can do about it now."

"And as for Raikou?" Suicune asked again, still wanting her answer.

"Well, Raikou, Victor and I had received a mission to investigate the Ruins of Alph. Apparently, Team Rocket had received reports from intel that they had perfected a brainwashing technology. And Team Rocket wanted us to retrieve the blueprints."

_"So… that's where they're hiding."_ Ethan noted mentally.

"We went in to get the blueprints, and we eventually came across a 3-way path. We all decided to head in different directions to cover more ground. On my path, I found these creepy hieroglyphics featuring… this monster that looked like me. One of them… showed this monster brainwashing an Infernape… Victor… my best friend…"

Buddy spoke up again awkwardly. "Would you actually…"

"Never." Typhlosion answered immediately. "I'd never do something that horrendous to my best friend… nevertheless, I cut out the hieroglyphic and put it in my pack. Soon after doing that, I heard a scream come from where Victor went. I found him being roasted by a horrifically powerful Fire attack from… Reshiram."

Everyone gasped. They now realized that this threat was much more serious than ever if they could successfully brainwash a Legendary Pokémon as powerful as Reshiram.

Typhlosion resumed his tale. "I was thankfully able to put the fire out. Shortly after, the rest of the cult found me and… worshipped me. They presented me with a grand dinner. And then they casually mentioned that they were brainwashing Raikou so that I'd have… a personal… s-slave."

Everyone remained deathly silent, except for Raikou's cybernetic parts which were still humming with life.

"…When I learned about that, Victor and I ran out and tried to find Raikou as quickly as we could. We followed his screams of torture and discovered him hooked up this… awful, horrible, and evil machine. It was grafting those parts onto him and brainwashing him to obey me. We pulled the machine off of him as fast as we could, but the parts were already screwed into his flesh, and we couldn't pull them off. When he did wake up, he… truly did become my personal slave. I had this awful feeling, and I puked my guts out and I…" he blubbered starting to tear up thinking about it again. "…I didn't want this for him."

Suicune looked about ready to burst into tears. "Please tell me this isn't permanent. Please tell me that there's a way to bring back the Raikou I know and love."

Suicune had expected a 'no' to come from Typhlosion's mouth. Instead, he said the opposite.

"Yes."

"…H-How?"

"We discovered him before the brainwashing was 'locked' so it IS reversible, but not easy. I've been trying to break through his brainwashing piece by piece, and I've brought by a little bit of him. And now that you're here, we might be able to break the barrier little by little until all of his memories are restored." said Typhlosion, with determination in his voice.

Suicune, overflowing with happiness at this realization, hugged Raikou passionately. Raikou flinched a bit at first, but then returned the hug.

"WhY?" he asked. "dO YoU sEEm sO… FaMiLiAr? I kNoW YoU… dOn'T I?"

Suicune smiled for the first time in a very long while. "Yes, Raikou. Yes, you do."

* * *

><p>Ethan and Lyra had decided to give the Pokémon space, and opted to leave the room. Ethan trusted Buddy enough to leave him with the Typhlosion now that everything was sorted out.<p>

"Hey… Typhlosion." Buddy muttered awkwardly.

"Yeah?" he answered tiredly.

"…This… isn't easy for me to say, but… um…" Buddy sighed. "I'm sorry. Ethan was talking to me about this earlier, and… my anger got the better of me. I…"

"Don't worry about it." Typhlosion muttered. "You were trying to protect your trainer. And you thought that I really did brainwash Raikou. That's plenty reason to be angry."

"I still should have at least let you explain yourself before I attacked you. I'm a 'Mon of action, and I act before I think."

"…Let's just forget about it. It's over now." Typhlosion muttered. "Uhh… what time is it?"

"About 4' o clock." Buddy answered. "Why?"

"That's not good." Typhlosion said to himself. "I need to be back at Rocket HQ by midnight."

Buddy seemed perplexed by this. "Why would you want to go back?"

"I still work for them, Buddy. Do you see that metal anklet attached to my foot?"

Buddy looked down at his feet. Indeed, a metal gray anklet was on his right foot.

"Yeah. There's one on Raikou, too." Buddy noted. "What about it?"

Typhlosion sighed. "That anklet is filled with a poison, Buddy. Every Pokémon recruit gets one of these strapped onto them. If I'm not back at the base by midnight, the poison will be injected into my body. It's a slow, painful killer, taking the victim's life within 24 hours. And Team Rocket has the only antidote."

Buddy was startled by this. "So that's how they keep you guys in line… isn't there any way to take it off?"

Typhlosion shook his head. "The only way to take it off is with an override code known only by the higher-ups at Team Rocket."

Buddy looked at the anklet again. He grabbed the anklet and tried to tear it off with his bare claws. He chomped on it, he clawed at it, and he yanked at it with all of his might. But it refused to come off.

"My word, that thing is stuck on you."

Typhlosion nodded. "I need to get back as soon as possible… or if someone could hack it to get the code, they could take it off. Both mine and Raikou's. But even the tech genius Pokémon that Team Rocket captured couldn't hack it. And you'd have to find someone before the poison activates…"

Buddy thought about this. "Well… I'm no tech wizard… but I know someone who is."

"Who?"

"Bill."

"Who's Bill?" Ty asked.

"Bill is the tech genius who designed the Pokémon Storage System. He lives in Goldenrod City in Johto, but we're very close to Saffron City. There's a train transit from Saffron City, which we can use to get to Goldenrod." the Feraligatr explained. "He might be able to get that thing off."

"What makes you so sure? Even Zekrom couldn't crack it, and he's a tech genius."

"Well… wait… Team Rocket actually captured Zekrom? How did I miss that memo?"

"It happened around 6 years ago. Team Rocket's been getting better about being discreet ever since you and Ethan first defeated them."

Buddy recalled the memory. 8 years ago, he and Ethan had stopped Team Rocket's sinister plot to control all of the Pokémon in Johto. But the crocodile hadn't heard anything from Team Rocket since he and Ethan defeated Giovanni at Tohjo Falls.

"So… Giovanni's back then, isn't he?"

Typhlosion nodded.

"So he DID survive… Looks like we'll have to thwart him again then, huh?"

"Good luck. Giovanni has come back to Team Rocket stronger than ever."

"And I'm back." Buddy smirked. "Stronger than ever. But first thing's first, we'll try to get you guys to Bill's as quickly as possible. I'll go tell Ethan."

The Feraligatr left the room, leaving Typhlosion to rest and Raikou and Suicune by themselves.

"Raikou…" Suicune said to him. "What do you remember?"

"…UhH… UmM… I kNoW tHAt… yOu aRe SuiCUnE."

"Yes." Suicune said.

"YoU… ArE my… SiSTeR. I hAvE a BroTHeR nAmED… EnTEi?"

"Yes, you're doing great. Keep going, there must be more you remember." Suicune persisted.

Raikou's robotic voice stuttered. "I-I… uMm… I C-caN'T rEmEmBEr aNYtHiNG eLSe." Despite the robotic tone, Raikou's voice was audibly cracking up in sadness. And Raikou himself cried for the first time since his conversion, finally showing sorrow at his fate.

"I-I'M sO SoRRy… SuiCUnE… I-I cAn'T rEmEmBeR. aT aLL."

Suicune hugged Raikou and brought him closer to her. She found herself crying into his shoulder, covered with the cyber armor. "It's… It's OK, Raikou. It's not your fault. We'll… figure something out. There-there must be some way to make you remember."

"…"

"Raikou?"

"…I dOn'T kNOw. I dOn'T kNOw hOw I cAn rEmEmBeR iF I aM JuST… a SiLhoUeTTe oF wHaT I oNCe WaS… I'M a StRaNGeR tO tHiS HeARTaCHe aNd PaiN I fEEL."

Typhlosion sighed as he watched the sad scene play in front of him. _"This is my fault." _he thought. _"…If only I had gotten there sooner… I just… how will I make him remember? Zekrom said it's possible… but I don't know how."_

"I'd give up my life if it meant that I could fix you. But-" Typhlosion said out aloud.

Suicune turned back to the Typhlosion, still lying in the bed weakened.

"-You just don't know what to do?" Suicune said, finishing Typhlosion's thoughts.

"…Yes." Typhlosion uttered.

"I don't know what to do, either." Suicune sighed. "I mean, part of me is still furious at you for having him as a slave… but at the same time, it wasn't you that did this."

"…To be honest Suicune, I don't even know everything that's going on. I don't know if those memories are still buried within him, or… if they were permanently erased. Zekrom told me we could possibly bring him out of this state… but we don't know what memories he'll have left. All we can do is support him. YOU have the memories with him. Maybe if you could remind him of the good times, it'll come back to him."

"…You're right." Suicune admitted. "We both- no… we ALL need to be there for him. I just want the brother I love back."

"…You're not the only one, Suicune…"

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Yes. Another chapter done. I realize that I have a horrible schedule slip, and I'm sorry to do that to you guys. Senior Project has kept getting in the way, along with just life in general. But, here's to hoping that you all enjoyed this chapter. As usual, Read and Review.

P.S. – Once again, the chapter title is taken from a song (I have a habit of doing that, don't I?). See if you can't figure it out.


	20. Operation Siberius

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 20: Operation Siberius

* * *

><p>"What the hell was that all about anyways?" Entei asked the Infernape and Zekrom once they came out of the bushes.<p>

"Nothing…" muttered Victor, trying to avoid eye-contact with Entei and Alakazam. "Well, it's kind of something really…"

Entei looked over the Infernape and Zekrom suspiciously. "What is this 'something' you're talking about?"

"It's… something important we need to tell you." Zekrom confessed.

Entei looked indifferently at them. "I don't care what you guys have to say unless it has to do with my…"

"It has to do with Raikou." the Infernape and Zekrom said in sync.

This had absolutely caught Entei's attention. For the past several days, Entei had been searching and worrying about Raikou. He didn't have any good, solid leads, bar his suspicion that Team Rocket had him. Despite his stubbornness, he knew that he should hear these two out.

"…Go on." Entei told them.

Victor sighed, not really wanting to tell Entei this at all. But he knew that he had no other option.

"…Raikou's not where you think he is. He's not at Team Rocket's base anymore."

Entei seemed startled by this. He was completely sure that Team Rocket had Raikou. What did the Infernape mean by what he said?

"…What happened to my brother?" Entei asked, his voice now hostile towards the Infernape.

"Exactly what he said." mentioned Zekrom, helping out the Infernape. "He's not at Team Rocket's HQ anymore."

"Then where the hell is he?"

"First, we have a really, really long story we'll need to tell you guys to explain this." began Victor. "We're from…"

"Team Rocket?" Alakazam interrupted.

"…Yeah." Victor said. "How'd you know that?"

"The uh, logo on those little metal anklets of yours kinda gave it away."

"Well… yeah." said Infernape. He noted that this conversation was getting awkward VERY quickly. He attempted to get the subject back onto Raikou.

"…Anyway…" he muttered. "I… uh… gosh, this is the second time I've had to break someone's spirit today… I…"

Realizing that this was going absolutely NOWHERE, Zekrom flat out told them. "I'm not going to sugar coat it for you, Entei. To make a long story short, Raikou got kidnapped from Team Rocket into this crazy-ass cult, got himself brainwashed and cyborgified, and now he's a mindless slave to a cyborg Typhlosion who wants no part in this. In a single sentence… that's pretty much it."

Entei heard the entire thing. He wasn't sure what to say, or even what to believe, after Zekrom told him. He didn't want to believe it. An insane cult? Getting brainwashed into serving a cyborg Typhlosion? It seemed way too outrageous to even have a single grain of truth to it. He briefly wondered if they had taken LSD or something along those lines. It had to be some sort of elaborate lie to get him to do something…

But what if they weren't lying? That possibility was still open. And what reason did they have to lie to him? If they were trying to lure him to be captured by Team Rocket as well, shouldn't they have directed him towards the base instead of away from it? It baffled him.

"…How do I know you guys are telling the truth?" Entei questioned. "Maybe you're right, or maybe you're lying. I can't figure it out. So many insane things have happened that it wouldn't surprise me if you two are really are being truthful."

"Well, you know what they say Entei." said Alakazam. "Even the most elaborate lies can have a kernel of truth to them."

"Can." Entei pointed out that specific word. "Can. Maybe. Perhaps. NOT a guarantee."

Victor took a glance at Alakazam. "You're a Psychic-type, right?"

"…No, I'm obviously a Fighting-type." Alakazam humorously snarked. "Yes, I am a Psychic-type. Your point being?"

"Well… this might be a violation of basic rights, but… could you probe our minds?"

Zekrom glared at Victor. "You. Me. Bushes. Now." The Dragon dragged the Infernape into the bushes, leaving a bewildered Alakazam and Entei behind… again.

* * *

><p>"Are you insane?!"<p>

"Trust me on this! Hear me out!"

After a few minutes, Zekrom finally calmed down enough to listen to what the Infernape had to say.

"…What?" Zekrom asked.

Victor sighed. "Alright. You might think of me as crazy, but there IS a reason why I asked Alakazam to probe our minds."

"To make sure we're telling the truth?" Zekrom said. "I understand that you want them to know we're being truthful, but… probing our minds?! I'm not sure I'm comfortable with that. You and I both have things that we'd rather not tell them."

"I know that, Zekrom." Victor acknowledged. "But there's really not any other way to convince them, is there?"

Zekrom sighed. "I know you're right. But… I don't want them to know about…"

"Reshiram." the two said simultaneously.

"Zekrom, I know how you feel. There are things that I've done for Team Rocket that I don't ever want to tell anyone else. Like killing Looker during his investigation. You think I want them to know that? But we're both going to have to make sacrifices if we want their help."

"…Understood." muttered Zekrom.

The two walked out of the bushes to see Entei and Alakazam again.

"Why do you two keep running off to those bushes?" asked an irritated Entei.

"No particular reason." claimed Victor. "Anyway, you want to know if we're telling the truth? Go ahead, have Alakazam probe our minds."

Alakazam looked over at Entei, then back to Victor and Zekrom. He raised his hand, and the other two Pokémon's heads started to glow a soft pink.

"You're sure you two want to do this?" asked Alakazam before he started to probe them.

Victor nodded. "Yes. We're ready."

"All right, then." Alakazam closed his eyes and started to sort through the memories of the two Pokémon. He found many things hidden away, many of which shocked him. As he hunted for the events that supposedly transformed Raikou into a mindless slave, Alakazam uncovered many, MANY secrets…

Victor was the one who murdered Looker, a cop from the Sinnoh region that was investigating Team Rocket. He had been shot with a bullet, but there had been no trace as to who could have done it as the killer was careful to not leave behind evidence (as Victor had probably been trained to do), and as such, the case went cold.

Zekrom was searching for Reshiram, another Legendary Pokémon that Zekrom's memories indicated was brainwashed by a mysterious cult…

He looked through Victor's memories, and discovered that he, Raikou, and this cyborg Typhlosion the Infernape mentioned had gone to the Ruins of Alph. Not only that, but as he progressed through the memories, he saw Victor and the Typhlosion uncover the scenario Raikou was in. When Raikou woke up and Alakazam analyzed him, he knew with absolute certainty that they were telling the truth.

"They aren't lying, Entei." Alakazam told the Legendary Fire-type as he stopped the probe. Entei looked at the two Rocket Pokémon, then back at Alakazam.

"Are you for real?" Entei muttered, not wanting to believe what he had been told.

Alakazam nodded slowly. "Yes. This cult, this cyborg Typhlosion, your brother being brainwashed and cyborgified into a slave… all of it is true."

Instead of an emotional breakdown like the other three expected, Entei stayed uncomfortably silent. Victor and Zekrom looked at him, waiting for any response.

"Where. Is. He?" said Entei, his voice as harsh as ice. He stared at the two with murderous intent, non-verbally ordering an answer.

Victor looked at Entei nervously, before eventually re-composing himself and started to execute his devised plan.

"I think I know where we can start our search." Victor said to him. "The Ruins of Alph."

"The Ruins of Alph?" Entei muttered in confusion. "Why there?"

"Because… you know how Zekrom said Raikou was basically brainwashed and cyborgified?"

"Yeah."

"That's where it happened. That's where that cult is."

"…"

"Entei?" Victor asked him.

And with that, Entei ran through Ecruteak City, heading for the Ruins of Alph as fast as his legs would carry him.

"Wait!" Victor yelled. Realizing that the Fire-type Legendary wasn't coming back, he ran after with Zekrom following. Alakazam watched the duo chase after Entei. He sighed.

"This is going to turn out disastrously, isn't it?" he muttered. With that, he quickly pursued the three, levitating quickly through the air.

* * *

><p><em>"Those bastards!" <em>Entei thought angrily to himself. _"They asked for it! They transformed my brother into an abomination! No mercy! I'm gonna kill them! No, I'm gonna torture them in the most gruesome ways possible slowly and painfully until they die!"_

He would've ran straight into the Ruins of Alph and been a prime target for another brainwashing and cyborgification had Victor not stopped him. The Infernape, being much faster than Entei, quickly caught up to him as Entei almost got into the Ruins. He tackled him from the side, knocking the Legendary to the side of the entrance of the Ruins.

"You can't go in there!" Victor yelled at him.

Entei recovered from the tackle and pinned Victor to the ground. "Tell me one good reason why I shouldn't kill all of them right this second!"

Victor struggled under his grip, looking up angrily at Entei. "You don't stand a chance by yourself unless you want to turn out like Raikou!"

It slowly sunk into Entei's head as he realized that the flaming monkey actually had a valid point. Slowly, he let Victor go from his tight grip.

Victor continued, his voice lowered now. "If you go in there by yourself without any backup, it's more than likely you'll turn out just like Raikou. Hell, they managed to that to RESHIRAM. And she's significantly more powerful than you. From what I've seen, these crazies aren't to be underestimated. It would be extremely foolish to do such a thing."

Entei listened to the advice Victor gave him. "Reshiram?" he muttered. "But… isn't she supposed to be one of the most powerful Fire-types to ever exist? Her power rivals even Ho-Oh's. It's hard to believe they could actually accomplish that."

"It's some powerful technology, Entei. And it's something to be feared."

Entei sighed in defeat as he sat against the wall. Zekrom and Alakazam had both caught up to the two by now. Alakazam was going to scold Entei, but it appeared that Victor had already done that for him. So he remained silent.

"What do we do then?" Entei asked the group, his voice breaking. "There's got to be some way to return Raikou to normal. He… he can't be stuck like this forever, right?"

"He might not be." Zekrom interrupted.

"W-What do you mean?"

"Well, this is the second time I've had to give this whole speech, but here I go again. His whole brainwashing and turning into a cyborg thing isn't permanent. Typhlosion and Victor right there managed to save him in time. No permanent lock was installed, giving him a better chance of breaking the brainwashing. Raikou's with Typhlosion now, and he's trying to reinforce your brother's original memories. That is, not of him being a slave, but of his life prior to this brainwashing. Once that's done, I can remove the cyborg parts. But I can't do that yet, or I risk hurting him. The short version: he can be saved. But we need to find him."

"And he has a tracking device installed on him from when he first had to join Team Rocket." Victor explained. "If we can sneak into there undetected and have Zekrom hack into a computer, we can use it to find where your brother is."

"Really?" muttered Entei. "That… that could work."

"I really need to emphasize that we can't attack them." Victor said again. "Not yet. If we can find Typhlosion and Raikou, they can help us find Suicune and then all of us could take these crazies on."

"Even then, it still won't be easy." Zekrom informed. "Reshiram is extremely powerful. Even with all of us together, beating her will be a very daunting task."

Entei sighed. "I gotcha. As much as I want to take my revenge right now, I guess I'll have to wait."

"Let's start this." smirked Victor. "Operation: Siberius."

Entei, Alakazam, and Zekrom all stared oddly at him. Victor shrugged his shoulders. "What? I just wanted to name this whole operation of ours something cool."

Alakazam sighed. "Let's just get going."

* * *

><p>The four of them snuck in through a side entrance to the Ruins rather than taking the obvious main path. Security had probably been up'd since Victor's last visit. They all stuck to the shadows, staying in them as much as possible. They spoke in whispers.<p>

"So, how do we go about doing this?" asked Entei.

"I don't know if we should split up like me and Ty did." said Victor. "We didn't know that anyone was here, so we had done that. Knowing what I know now, I think splitting up is too risky. We're much better off sticking together. Strength in numbers, after all. Besides, if we're all together, we have a much better chance of defending ourselves than we would alone."

"Point taken, Victor." Alakazam acknowledged. "But where should we start searching?"

"There's only one path in front of us right now." Victor noted. "Let's start sneaking."

The quartet of Pokémon started to maneuver the hallway, sticking to the dark shadows to make sure they weren't seen by any cult members. A few had walked by, but they counted their blessings since no one fortunately saw them.

* * *

><p>Eventually, the four of them made it to what looked like a main control room. They stayed in the shadows of the room as they creeped into the area. One of the cult members was on the computer, trying to find a way to discover Raikou. He muttered what sounded like gibberish tech to Entei, Victor, and Alakazam. Zekrom, being the tech genius, was the only one that understood any of it.<p>

"You have any idea what they're planning to do?" Entei whispered to him.

"It appears that they plan to use a binary code-breaking access detection method by utilizing Raikou's TR tracker to pinpoint his current location."

The three other Pokémon stared at him in complete confusion, having no idea what he just said.

"Could you repeat that in English, please?" Entei requested.

Zekrom sighed. "In English… they plan to hack into Team Rocket's database and use their tracking info on Raikou to find him. If I can get to the computer, I can use the same method to find Raikou as well."

"Well, that makes more sense." Entei said. "But how do we get that guy away from the computer so you can use it?"

Victor smirked. "Leave that to me. You guys stay in the shadows."

Victor stepped out of the shadows, but did so extremely quietly. He quickly ran up to behind the chair the cult member was in. Utilizing a method he learned while training with Team Rocket, he grabbed him from behind and compressed his chest. He squeezed his chest with one arm and covered his mouth with the other. By hitting the right pressure points and temporarily cutting off his air, he knocked the cult member out cold. Satisfied with his work, he put the unconscious person to the side of the room. He turned back to face the other three Pokemon.

"How's that for you?" Victor smirked.

"Don't get too cocky with yourself, Victor." Zekrom cautioned as he sat in the large computer chair.

"Is he dead?" Alakazam asked.

"Nah, he's just unconscious." Victor told him. "I learned the technique while I was raised by Team Rocket. He'll be out for about an hour. Does that give you enough time, Zekrom?"

"More than enough. I'll only need fifteen minutes."

Zekrom started from where the cult member left out in his hacking. Since Zekrom was more familiar with the security structures of Team Rocket's database than the cult, it took him very little time to hack the database and access the information.

"So, tell me where Raikou is." Entei ordered.

"Hold your horses." Zekrom told him. "I'm looking it up right this second."

As Zekrom finished his sentence, an image of Cerulean City appeared on the computer screen. "That's where he is. Cerulean City. According to the trackers, Typhlosion's also there with him."

"Well, that's only common sense." Victor said. "The two left headquarters together."

"Alakazam, can you teleport all of us to Cerulean?" Entei requested of him.

"I don't know." he confessed. "I've never teleported more than two living beings at a time. While I have been to Cerulean City and can teleport there, I don't know if I have the ability to take all four of us."

"…Are you willing to try? For me? For my brother?" Entei asked.

"…"

"Alakazam?" Entei asked again.

"…Well, I can give it a shot." Alakazam said.

Alakazam closed his eyes and started to calm his mind. He had to be absolutely calm and prepared to teleport this many Pokémon from Johto to Kanto. As his mind relaxed, pink lights enveloped all four of them. After a minute, they started to glow brighter as Alakazam prepared to begin teleporting.

And as soon as they arrived, they vanished without a trace.

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

I suck. I really do. I've been meaning to get this chapter posted MUCH sooner, but I kept putting it off. So much has been going on in my life that distracted me from writing. I know I'm not the best updater in the world, and I really hope I can finish this before the end of 2013. Thanks again for sticking with me, and look forward to the next chapter!


	21. Hurts and Healings

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 21: Hurts and Healings

* * *

><p>The hospital room was uncomfortably silent as Ethan and Lyra came back into the room to check on the Pokémon.<p>

"How did things go?" Ethan asked his Feraligatr, sitting down in a chair facing the bed.

"Well… better, at least." Buddy muttered. "We kinda got things straightened out, and I apologized how attacking him so violently."

"That's good." Ethan nodded.

"But…" Buddy continued. "…We're going to have to make a change in our original plans from finding Entei. We need to get to Goldenrod City as fast as possible."

This beset Ethan with curiosity. They've been on a journey for several days with plans to go to Celadon City and get Entei back from Eusine. "Why would we have to change our plans? And why do we need to get to Goldenrod?"

"Well, Mr. Cyborg told me a lot about his situation and what he's stuck in."

"I know that. He told me too."

"But… there's more he told me when you left the room."

Ethan looked at the Typhlosion on the bed of the Pokémon Center, still tired, worried, and upset. While he said nothing, Typhlosion's open eyes as he stared at the ceiling spoke volumes.

"What else did he tell you?" Ethan questioned Buddy further.

Buddy glanced back at the cyborg Typhlosion, and pointed to a metal anklet attached to him.

"Wait a second… I didn't notice that metal anklet before."

Buddy nodded. "He told me the whole story behind this thing. You know how he's forced to work for Team Rocket, right?"

"Yeah."

"Well, this is what keeps their Pokémon in check."

Ethan looked on, intrigued by this device. "What does it do?"

"I was getting to that." he replied grumpily. "Anyway, here's how the whole thing works. It's about 5:30 right now, correct?"

Ethan flipped out his Pokégear and checked the time. "5:37 to be more precise."

Buddy rolled his eyes, continuing on with his explanation. "Every night at midnight, if the Pokémon recruited by Team Rocket don't return to their base, this anklet activates a poison."

This startled Ethan. "A poison? Wouldn't that be curable with an Antidote I could buy at a Pokémart? There's one right next to the Pokémon Center that I could run over to…" he said, starting to leave.

"Don't bother." said Typhlosion and buddy simultaneously.

He looked at them in confusion. "Why not? Poison's a status ailment that can be cured with an Antidote, right?"

Typhlosion had to chuckle a little bit. "If it was that easy, Team Rocket wouldn't have so many captive Pokémon. No. This is a specially produced type of Poison. One that kills."

Ethan looked back at Typhlosion. It didn't surprise him that Team Rocket would pull off something like that. Back when he first stopped them, Team Rocket wasn't this level of evil. Now? They weren't above anything. 8 years is a lot of time for the organization to rebuild and change itself completely.

Typhlosion continued. "As Buddy mentioned earlier, if Raikou and I don't return to the base by midnight, this poison will activate. And Team Rocket has the only antidote."

"So, what you're saying is, we need to sneak into Team Rocket's base and get that antidote? Is their base still in Mahogany Town?"

"Yes, actually." Typhlosion nodded. "But Buddy here had a suggestion that, if we can get to Goldenrod City before midnight, Bill could help take it off before the poison activates."

"Bill…" Ethan muttered. "Yeah, he lives in Goldenrod City. He's a computer genius, so he might be able to help you guys out. But midnight? It's already 5:40 now! We need to get going! There's a train in Saffron City nearby that leads to Goldenrod, so we should be able to get to Bill's house before that poison starts up. I'll go check Typhlosion out of the hospital, and tell the Nurse Joy here our situation." Ethan left the room to do so.

Suicune looked over the silent, cyborgified Raikou with worry. So, they had a time limit to get these anklets off before the poison in them would kill the Pokémon. Suicune also wondered if Bill could take off Raikou's equipment and restore him to normal, but Raikou didn't seem to have all of his memories back yet. Suicune didn't want to risk Raikou never regaining his original memories, so she reluctantly decided to not have Bill take off the cyber armor until Raikou was ready.

Lyra walked over to the cyborg Typhlosion and looked over him. "Can you stand up?" she asked.

"I can give it a shot." he replied.

Slowly, Typhlosion began to shift around in the bed. It hurt to move after having such a brutal beat-down courtesy of Buddy, but he didn't have any other option. He knew that he had to get to Bill's, and despite the pain, he was determined.

His feet made soft contact with the ground, with the rest of his body making a mechanical 'clang' sound. Usually, his parts were quiet, but being out of commission left him a bit unsteady. He held onto the corner post of the bed to keep his balance. It seemed that his cyborg parts always weighed 20 times as much as they usually did whenever he was seriously injured.

"You need any help?" Lyra asked him.

"No, no. I'm OK. I'll be fine." Typhlosion reassured her.

He slowly let go of the corner post to attempt walking. His parts felt like they dragged his body down as he tried to walk. Trying to get used to the extra weight of the cyborg parts again wasn't going to be as easy as Typhlosion wished it would, but he knew he'd readapt to the additional weight in good time.

"Gee, I must've really messed you up back there on Route 3." Buddy chuckled nervously. "Sometimes, I guess I forget my own strength."

"Don't worry over it." Typhlosion said to him. "I forget my own strength as a cyborg a lot. More times than I care to remember. But what's important now is that we get to Goldenrod City as fast as possible for Bill's help to get these anklets off."

"I think the Magnet Train in Saffron City leaves for Goldenrod in about an hour. Saffron City's literally just a hop, skip, and a jump away from Cerulean. We can get there in five minutes." Buddy said. "And Ethan should be…"

"I'm done." said Ethan, coming back in. "I just checked you out Typhlosion. We can leave now."

"That's good." Typhlosion nodded. "I'm having a little trouble walking, but I'll be fine."

"Looks like we'll have to take a detour from getting Entei at Celadon City, huh?" Suicune sighed, not wanting to leave Entei trapped with Eusine. "…But I understand. We should get going to Goldenrod City to get Bill's help. I don't want Raikou to get poisoned by those drugs and… die." she whispered out the last word. Her eyes started to tear up. And really, no one could blame her. She had both of her brothers ripped apart from her, and when she finally finds one, he's brainwashed and stuck as a cyborg slave.

Raikou looked at Suicune. The smallest bit of life started to spark from his eyes. He couldn't remember a lot about Suicune, but for some reason, seeing her sad made him feel sad too. And it didn't only make him feel sad, it even made him hurt inside.

The cyborg Legendary approached Suicune.

"I… UhH…"

Suicune remained quiet and still tearful, listening to Raikou.

"P-PLeAsE dOn'T cRy." he managed to say. Slowly, he moved closer to Suicune and hugged his front arms around her head.

"…It… It HuRTs mE… iN-iNSiDe wHeN yOu cRy."

Suicune couldn't help but smile softly as she returned the hug, with her soft warm paws wrapped around the cold metal armor of her brainwashed brother.

"I… I dOn'T kNoW wHy iT HuRTs sO MuCH… b-bUT I dOn'T LiKe tO sEE yOu cRy. PLeASe dOn'T cRy. PLeASe. FoR… FoR mE? I-I cAN gEt BEtTeR. I-I PrOmiSE, SUiCunE."

Suicune smiled happily as she dried her tears. Her brother was still in there. The same caring brother who warmed her on those cold days, and who always swam with her in the Lake of Rage when Entei couldn't take the time off. She knew that now beyond the shadow of a doubt. All that was left to do was to fully bring him back.

"Thank you so much, Raikou."

Ethan smiled at the scene, as well as Lyra and the others. But Ethan knew that despite the happy moment, they still had to continue on.

"Are you guys ready?" he asked them. Typhlosion, Buddy, and Suicune nodded their heads. Raikou, however, tried to emulate the natural motion with the armor on to the best of his ability. After the others did, he managed to nod his head in a more human way than mechanical. It felt fluid and natural rather than rigged and robotic.

Typhlosion looked on at Raikou with happiness, seeing that his progress was making leaps and bounds, with sincere emotion towards Suicune. His attempt to try to adapt to more natural ways instead of acting pre-programmed signified the beginning of the brainwashing breaking down.

"Come on guys." Ethan said to the group. "Let's get to Saffron."

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon ©Nintendo  Game Freak_

Yeah, I know. Short chapter. I just wanted to elaborate on Raikou's and Suicune's feelings a little bit before they leave. The next chapter will feature their journey to hopefully get to Goldenrod. As always, read and review.


	22. Mass Transit Trouble (Part 1)

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 22: Mass Transit Trouble (Part 1)

* * *

><p>"Oof!" came a large grunt from just outside the Cerulean City Pokémon Center. Every single one of the Pokémon that Alakazam managed to teleport to Cerulean was now face-down on the concrete.<p>

Entei stood up first, glancing at Alakazam. "Can we teleport just once without our faces colliding into the ground?" he snarked. As worried about Raikou as he was, the relief of him being alive was enough to bring back some of Entei's snarky characteristic.

"Just be happy I got us here all in one piece, Entei. You're lucky nothing bad happened, like all of us swapping bodies."

"…That actually happened to you once?"

"…Yeah. Me and Eusine. It was on a visit to Ecruteak. Took some of Morty's mumbo-jumbo ghost magic to get us back in the right bodies. It was kinda creepy… but at the same time, I don't regret the experience. Eusine and I had a lot of fun in each other's bodies. I only wish that his obsession with Suicune hadn't… well, you know."

"Yeah. Sorry about that again."

"It's not your fault."

Finally, the other two Pokémon began to stir. Victor and Zekrom stood up, and wiped some of the blood from the collision with the concrete off of their faces. Entei's eyes widened in shock.

"Are you guys all right?" he said, concerned. "That fall did a big number on your faces!"

"It's fine." Victor assured them, chuckling. "Tis but a scratch."

"Are you sure?" Alakazam asked, noticing their bleeding faces.

"Yeah." Zekrom assured him. "We've been in worse situations. Legendaries heal pretty quickly."

"Plus, I've got that accelerated healing serum Team Rocket injected into me." Victor said to them. "If there's one good thing Team Rocket did, it was that serum. It was developed for all of the working Pokémon after Typhlosion's… accident. They didn't use it on Typhlosion for fear of… incompatibility."

"…I see." Entei nodded. He was somewhat amazed at how calmly Victor and Zekrom took all of this. The whole being captured by them, working for them, being able to handle tasks of murder for their organization, easily recruiting more Pokémon for Team Rocket… It occurred to Entei, that even if they hated working for them, there is no denying that they are damn good at what they do.

"Anyway…" said Entei again, concluding his thoughts. "We should probably get to finding Raikou and Typhlosion now."

* * *

><p>As the Pokémon outside the Cerulean City Pokémon Center discussed their plans, a Typhlosion from inside the room heard something from outside his window.<p>

"Uhh, guys?" Typhlosion said to the rest of the group outside of the room.

"Yeah?"

"I think I heard something from outside. Could you wait here a second?"

"A second?" muttered an (understandably) impatient Suicune. "We only have a couple of hours so Raikou and you don't DIE!"

Without responding back to Suicune, he walked back over to the window, leaving the rest of the group outside the room.

"What is with him?" Suicune grumbled.

"…sUiCuNe."

She looked over to hear her brother's deep, synthesized, and robotic voice.

"…Yeah?"

"…GiVe TyPhLoSiOn sOmE TiMe." he told her.

"…But we don't have time." Suicune muttered a bit more quietly.

"…sUiCuNe. I kNOw yOu aRe WoRRiEd aBoUt mE. BuT pLeAsE aLLoW TyPhLoSiOn tO hAVe sOMe TiMe. hE iS aWaRE oF wHAt RiSK wE ArE aT. iT cOuLd bE sOMeThiNG iMPorTaNT."

Suicune sighed. "If you say so, Raikou."

* * *

><p>Typhlosion walked over to the window. He could have sworn he heard something come from outside. Unlocking the second-floor window, he opened it and peeked outside. What he saw just below the building filled him with absolute joy.<p>

"VICTOR!"

The Infernape looked up to hear a familiar voice say his name. Seeing him, he was absolutely thrilled.

"TYPHLOSION!"

Without even hesitating, Victor immediately jumped onto the building and started to climb up it, leaping through the second story window. The two hugged each other in a touching embrace, before letting go and answering the obvious questions from the rest of the group.

"Who…?" Buddy began, before he was interrupted.

"Heh. Sorry for not getting to him, guys." Typhlosion apologized. "This is my best friend ever since we sorta got to know each other while working for Team Rocket."

The rest of the group was still a bit startled by the Infernape suddenly swinging into the room. At least, until Ethan became absolutely intrigued with him. "What's a Sinnoh Pokémon doing here in Johto?" he asked, his curiosity as a Pokémon trainer getting the better of him.

"It's a long story." said Victor and Typhlosion in sync. They then both chuckled a bit at speaking in sync.

"How did you get here, Typhlosion?" Victor had to ask, before glancing over at Ethan. "And meet up with the Legendary Johto Champion?!"

Ethan had to blush a bit. "Well, maybe 'Legendary' is over-stating it a little." he chuckled. Everyone always seemed to admire him, but that's probably to be expected when you become the Champion of an entire region. Lance still battles trainers in his position as a former Champion, since Ethan can't fulfill it. However, only Ethan managed to beat the Legendary Dragon-type Champion of Johto.

"They even sell plush dolls of us now." Buddy added to the conversation.

Typhlosion and Victor chuckled. "No surprise there. But as for how I ended up here, Victor…"

Typhlosion began to explain everything that had happened since he and Raikou departed from the Team Rocket base. Raikou starting to recover his memories, meeting up with Suicune and Ethan, and nearly getting beaten up to a pulp by Buddy. He also introduced the rest of the group, including Buddy, Suicune, and Lyra.

"So now your next plan of action is to go to Goldenrod City, find Bill, and get him to help you take off your metal anklets?"

Typhlosion nodded. "That's pretty much the plan in a nutshell."

"I see. I guess I'll join you guys and get mine off as well. I mean, the only thing I have close to a home is Team Rocket's base. It's not exactly a home I want to go back to, you know. Oh, by the way, there's something I need to…"

"Uh, excuse me." Buddy interrupted. "I hate to break up the whole happy friendship reunion thing, but we HAVE to get to Saffron City so we can catch the train to Goldenrod."

Typhlosion sighed. "He's right, Victor. Tell me on the way to Saffron."

Victor nodded as the whole group left the room. After clearing all the papers for Typhlosion to be checked out of the Pokémon Center, the group went outside… to see another three Pokémon.

"Victor!" yelled the Zekrom up to the window.

"Hey, I'm right here." he said. The other three Pokémon: Entei, Zekrom, and an Alakazam, immediately noticed him. Entei spoke up. "Victor, what was with-"

Entei immediately stopped himself when he saw someone that he hadn't seen since Eusine captured him.

"Suicune!" Entei exclaimed.

"Entei!" shouted an ecstatic Suicune. The two pounced on each other, playfully rolling around in the grass as they embraced one another.

"Thank goodness you're OK." the two said in sync.

"What's going on?" Entei asked anxiously. "Where's Raikou? Did you find him?!"

Suicune sighed. "Yes, we found him… well, I found him with that cyborg Typhlosion over there." she said, pointing to the entrance where he was. Entei gave him a menacing glare, but Typhlosion simply stayed quiet.

"It's not his fault." Suicune tried to re-assure her Fire type brother. "It's… well…"

"…You don't need to tell me." Entei sighed. "Victor and Zekrom already gave me the whole story."

"…Oh." muttered Suicune.

"But I still need my question answered. WHERE is Raikou? I'm worried sick about him. And I want to see my brother, brainwashed and cyborgified and all. He's still my brother."

"He's right here." Typhlosion said, speaking up to Entei. He moved to the side, revealing a radically different Raikou than the one Entei remembered. Even though Entei was told of what condition Raikou was in, it nearly broke his heart seeing him like this in person. As some sort of soulless robot. He approached his cyborgified brother, trying to find the right words to say. He sat in front of him for a few moments, not entirely sure of what to do.

As then a paw was set on his shoulder.

Raikou's.

Entei looked at him, smiling with tears in his eyes.

"En-eNtEi… BrOThER… iT iS mE… R-RAiKoU. i'M hErE."

At that point, Entei lost all of the composure he had managed to maintain. Entei hugged him and cried happily into his cyborg brother's shoulder.

"You're still in there." Entei whispered.

Even Buddy couldn't help but smile, though he knew that they all had to get back on track.

"Uhh… hate to be the party pooper again guys, but… Goldenrod? Are we getting there? If we don't get to Goldenrod by midnight, Typhlosion, Raikou, Victor, AND Zekrom could all die from that anklet poison!"

Everybody's eyes widened in realization. Buddy was right. They had to get to Saffron City to catch the train to Goldenrod, and the newly formed group couldn't afford to waste any more time. Zekrom was a tad upset that he couldn't just go straight to Reshiram, but if he could remove the object keeping him bound to Team Rocket, he could try to recover Reshiram from her assimilation and head back home to Unova at long last.

The entire group departed for Saffron, with the top priority being to get to Bill's house as soon as possible…

* * *

><p>"So… the tracker says that they are on their way to Saffron?"<p>

Simon looked up and bowed respectfully before his master, Xaphan.

"Yes, sir."

"Use your Pidegot to get to Saffron. Then get onto the next train to Goldenrod."

"Master, if I may inquire… why would they be taking the train to Goldenrod?"

"A technological genius lives in Goldenrod, Simon. Bill, who made the Pokémon Storage System. Hypothetically, they will likely request his help to de-cyborgify Raikou. And then we lose him, as we could not put a lock on him."

"…I see that, sir."

"If they aren't directly flying to Goldenrod, then they're going to be using the next train that leaves in about an hour."

"But how can I bring them back here without any other Pokémon to best them with?"

"…Do you have the bomb?"

"…Yes."

"Then you won't need any other Pokémon."

* * *

><p>"It's a good thing that was such a short trip from Cerulean." Buddy said as the group arrived at Saffron City.<p>

"We should get on the transit to Goldenrod as soon as possible." Ethan reminded him.

"But can't we get something to eat first? I haven't eaten anything since Pewter City and I get cranky when I'm hungry… Plus, we wouldn't want to have to file a police report for a dead, chewed-up trainer, now would we?" Buddy said in a menacing tone, joking around with his trainer.

Ethan chuckled at this threat, knowing well enough Buddy wouldn't actually be cruel enough to do something like that. Still, he had to agree. The group hadn't bothered to pick up any food in Cerulean City due to rushing to get Typhlosion to the Pokémon Center. "Maybe we can stop by somewhere."

Zekrom spoke up. "But we don't have a lot of time. It's already 7:00 p.m. And we can't afford to waste any more of it."

Ethan looked at his Pokégear. Indeed, the time read 7:01 p.m. He sighed. "He's right, Buddy. I know you're hungry, but we have lives at stake. You can eat on the train to Goldenrod, OK?"

"All right…" he muttered, a bit disappointed but understanding the intensity of the situation.

"DoN't sAy tHe WoRd sTeAk… nOw i'M gEttiNG HuNgRy tOo." Raikou chuckled, starting to win the mental war in his mind. Even more of his personality was coming back, and it wouldn't be long before they could remove the cyborg parts off of him.

Suicune couldn't help but smile. Her brother was always something of a big eater. "We'll have plenty of time to eat on the way there." she assured both her brother and the hungry Feraligatr.

The group headed to the transit station, to get on the monorail train to Saffron.

"Wait… before we go inside…" Zekrom muttered. "Shouldn't we do something about us? You know, the Legendaries?" he said, motioning to himself, Raikou, Entei, and Suicune.

"Well, my case is taken care of." Suicune assured them. With those words, Ethan recalled Suicune back into her Pokéball.

Entei looked at Ethan. "You caught her?"

"Yes." Ethan said. "Well, sort of. She WANTED to be my Pokémon again. So, I caught her with a Pokéball and she didn't have any issues with it."

"Really? Then in that case… you have another spare Pokéball, Ethan?"

"I always keep a few spares on me. You're saying that you also want to be my Pokémon again?"

"It's not like I exactly mind." Entei explained. "You're an exceptional trainer, and I would actually like to have the good times back again once this fiasco is all over."

"Those were some good times." Ethan chuckled, remembering some of the memories he and the trio had together before he decided to release them.

"Why exactly did you release us?" Entei asked. "I know you said that we deserved freedom… but I never exactly felt 'enslaved' in any way under you. You always treated us as partners when we were in battle. I really did like battling with you. It was a lot of fun, kicking everybody's asses."

"I thought you guys would like freedom more. I didn't know you were so fond of me. But if you want to be my Pokémon again…"

Ethan drew out a Pokéball from his backpack, aiming it at Entei.

"…then get ready."

As per the usual capturing tradition, Entei was sucked into the light of the Pokéball. It shook three times before it clicked shut, signifying the catch. He took the ball and stored it back into his backpack.

Raikou looked at him and nodded, saying without words that he wanted the same thing. Memories of Ethan had come back to him, but it didn't cause him physical pain this time. Ethan threw the Pokéball at Raikou, and he too was now under Ethan's official ownership.

"I'll let you guys out in the train." he assured him.

"But what about me?" Zekrom asked. "I'm not interested in being caught. I still have a fiancée to save, and a home to go back to."

Lyra thought about this for a moment, getting an idea. Out of her backpack, she pulled out:

"A jumpsuit?" Zekrom asked, confused.

"It's simple, really. All you need to do is wear this on the train to Saffron City, and everybody will think you're a contender for the Pokéalthon!"

Zekrom had been trapped in Johto for a number of years, but he never had the chance to fully understand what the Pokéalthon was about.

"The Pokéalthon is kind of like an Olympics for Pokémon." Lyra explained. "Some people, like yours truly, train their Pokémon for these athletic events. The Pokéalthon center is just north of Goldenrod, so people will easily think that you're a contender. Legendary Pokémon have been known to participate in the events as well, so people won't think anything is out of the ordinary." she smiled.

"That's… pretty clever." Zekrom admitted. "I'll bite."

Within a few moments, Zekrom changed into the one size fits all jumpsuit, ready to go.

"How do I look?" Zekrom questioned.

"You work it pretty well." Ethan admitted. "Now come on, let's get on the transit!"

The rest of the group headed to the front line to check into the monorail train, completely unaware of the cult's plans to sabotage the trip…

* * *

><p>"You still have your transit ticket with you, right?" Buddy asked his owner.<p>

"Of course. Why would I lose infinite free rides to and from Johto and Kanto?"

Ethan, Buddy, Typhlosion, Victor, Alakazam, Lyra, and the Zekrom in a track jumpsuit walked up to the ticket checker.

"Ticket, please." the man asked in his usual uninterested voice, not bothering to look up. Ethan handed him the transit ticket, which he had received long ago from the Copycat girl by doing her a favor.

"Ethan…" he said, looking at the ticket and noticing the familiar name and picture on the ticket. "Wait… are you the Johto Champion Ethan?!" he said excitedly, his monotone and uninterested voice completely disappearing.

Ethan chuckled embarrassingly. "Must you bring all the attention to us?" he said, noticing all the eyes on him and his group at the ticket checker.

"I… I'm so sorry, sir." the man stuttered. "It's… It's just such an honor to meet the Johto Champion in person. Uhh… can you sign this piece of paper for me before you go on? M-My daughter and I are such huge fans. We have the plushies and everything of you and your Feraligatr!"

Ethan chuckled. "All right, all right." he said, signing the paper. "But we really need to get to Goldenrod quickly. It's extremely important."

"S-Sure." he told him. "Go on ahead."

"Thank you."

The group boarded the monorail train, with Zekrom just BARELY squeezing through the entrance. Behind them came another man.

"Identification please." he said, his uninterested voice returning to the next man.

"Simon, as far as you need to know."

"Where is your ticket with the rest of your info on it?"

The red-hooded man couldn't afford to give up any further identification, so to get past him, he used a couple of secret techniques to silently knock him into unconsciousness. He quietly looked around, with no one noticing. Smirking to himself, he skipped past by the security check and boarding the train as its' last passenger. The doors locked shut, and the train departed, with one cult-terrorist ready to use all means necessary to re-capture the Raikou that had eluded his group. And if the Raikou found any extra friends… well, it would just be the icing on the cake.

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Yep, the long-awaited next chapter is here. I'm not going to bother apologizing again, but my update schedule is likely to become even more erratic as I graduate high school and prepare for college. Anyway, read and review, as always!


	23. Mass Transit Trouble (Part 2)

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 23: Mass Transit Trouble (Part 2)

* * *

><p>"You know, I never get tired of boarding this train." Buddy commented as he walked in. "The comfortable cabins, the smell of food being served, the sensation of speed I get when I hang my head out the window…"<p>

The group had boarded the monorail train, with Ethan letting out the Legendary Beasts. Since they were officially under his ownership, they didn't have to worry about being caught by someone else now. Plus, you know… no one would DARE steal Pokémon from the Champion of the Johto Region, unless they wanted their reputation to become irreparable.

"…hE hAnGs HiS hEaD oUt oF tHe WiNdOw? rEaLLy? iS hE pARt doG? I cAn PiCTuRe iT nOw. STeP RiGHt uP, fOLks. CoMe sEE tHe wOrLd'S FirSt pARt-doG FeRaLiGaTR!" Raikou commented, sarcasm becoming quite clearly evident from his robotic tone. Buddy crossed his arms, very unamused.

Suicune grinned. "Someone's certainly improved since I first saw him as a mindless drone."

Raikou managed a grin underneath his helmet. "gEtTiNg BeTTeR aLL tHe TiMe, SUiCunE."

Zekrom grinned. "I think you're quite ready to get those parts removed, Raikou. Of course, I don't have the tools to do it here. Once we get to Bill's and get these anklets removed, my first job will be to get those cyborg hunks off of you… and get this tight jumpsuit off." he commented, trying to stretch the piece of clothing. "I can barely breathe in this thing!"

Raikou chuckled. "SoUnDs gReAt tO mE, ZeKRoM."

"Enough small talk. Where's the buffet? I'm so hungry, I could probably eat HIM." Buddy stated, pointing at Zekrom. The Dragon Pokémon backed away slightly.

Ethan glanced over at his partner. "Where it always is."

Buddy grinned, running over to the dining car. "Last one there pays!" he said, with the hungry Legendaries, Typhlosion, Victor, and Alakazam following.

Ethan rolled his eyes. "I'm the only one with any money, you goofballs!" he shouted at them, catching up.

…From behind Ethan emerged a red-cloaked figure, who Ethan didn't see in his rush to the dining car. He went the opposite direction that Ethan and the Pokémon did, going towards Ethan's cabin…

The red-cloaked figure only known as 'Simon' passed by several other passengers, who had noticed him, but didn't really give the suspicious figure any second thought. He soon arrived at a large, luxurious cabin, clearly reserved for the Johto Champion. Walking inside, he looked around. He held the bomb in his hands, trying to find a good place to hide so it wouldn't be seen until it was too late. Glancing around, he found a cabinet in the back, completely empty. Smirking, he put the bomb way into the back of the cabinet. He looked at his watch.

"7:30." he noted. "The train just started moving, and it's about an hour and a half trip to Goldenrod, so they would normally arrive at 9:00… well, would." he chuckled. He set a 50-minute time limit on the bomb, so it would explode and severely damage the train while it was in the middle of the Mt. Silver pass between Johto and Kanto at 8:20. Finally activating it, he chuckled evilly, before leaving the room and heading towards the very back of the train. He would come back and swipe all of Ethan's Pokémon when they went into a critical state, reviving them all as mindless slaves…

* * *

><p><em>7:32 p.m.<em>

"So, what will it be, Buddy?" Ethan asked him, and the other Pokémon with them… oh yeah, and Lyra.

"Steak, of course." Buddy grinned. "I can't ever get enough meat to eat."

"All right then, Buddy."

"I'll take a salad." Lyra requested of the waiter.

The other Pokémon looked over the list, not sure what all of these items were. Typhlosion and Victor in particular did not know ANY of these foods. They never really ate anything outside of the sub-standard food Team Rocket provided them.

"What… do you think would be good, Ethan?" Typhlosion asked. "I've never exactly ordered a four-star meal before."

Ethan thought for a moment. "What was your favorite food to eat back in Team Rocket? That they provided?"

Typhlosion recalled the food almost immediately. "The Italian Pizza on Tuesdays." he said. "Though, it was always a bit bland… and by 'a bit', I mean 'had barely any cheese and sauce'."

"What about you, Victor?" Buddy asked instead of Ethan this time.

Victor had to think longer than Typhlosion on his favorite food. "I'm a big Berry lover." he stated. "For my brief time free from Team Rocket, I absolutely GOURGED on Berries."

Ethan looked at the two again, smiling this time. "Typhlosion, I think you would really love the Pizza they offer here. It's an amazing dish; I've tried it myself."

"I'll give it a shot." Typhlosion nodded.

"And Victor," Ethan continued. "They have a Berry Bowl entrée here with at least one of every Berry imaginable. Even the rare ones, like the Enigma and Rowap Berries from Hoenn and Sinnoh."

"Sounds good to me!" Victor agreed.

"I'll take the Chinese chicken lo mein." Alakazam said. "It was one of my favorite dishes than Eusine used to order for me whenever we went out. Used to, anyways."

With Alakazam's passing mention of Eusine, Entei suddenly remembered the deal he had made with Alakazam. He knew that Alakazam wanted Suicune to see Eusine, even though that couldn't be done until this entire fiasco was over. Still, he figured that he should tell Suicune now. When the Legendary Beasts also ordered what they wanted, the waiter left to cook their orders. Entei and Suicune left the table briefly to talk privately. Alakazam, having a hunch about what it was, listened in with his psychic powers.

"Hey… Suicune?" Entei said.

"Yeah?"

"Can I talk to you about something?"

"Of course, Entei. What is it?"

"It's… about Eusine." Entei said a bit hesitantly.

Suicune groaned. "That creep? Why do you want to talk about him?"

"Well… I made a deal with Alakazam." Entei confessed.

"Why would you do that?"

"…He's the one who helped me escape Eusine. That is Eusine's Alakazam."

Suicune's eyes widened. "Are you serious?"

"Dead serious." Entei replied, with no joking tone in his voice whatsoever.

"…What was the deal?" Suicune demanded to know.

"…Once this was over… once this entire disaster with Raikou, and Team Rocket, and this wacko cult was cleared up… I promised him I would take you to see Eusine as my gratitude for freeing me."

Suicune was silent for a moment before speaking up again. "You made a deal with him… to take ME to that CREEP?!"

Entei sighed. "Suicune, please. You know how desperate Eusine is to see you."

"I don't care. I don't want to see his face. Not ever. Not after he kidnapped you like that."

"…You don't get it, do you Suicune?"

"Get WHAT?!"

"…Suicune. Alakazam ABANDONED his master. He helped me escape, and if it wasn't for him, I'd still be trapped with Eusine!"

"…So?" she said, this time a bit more weakly.

"I owe this to him, Suicune. He wants his master to stop obsessing for you as much as you do. This obsession of his has only gotten worse, Suicune. He wanted to keep me for ransom to lure you to him."

"…" Suicune couldn't find any words to say. She had to deeply think about what Entei had told her. Entei continued on.

"Suicune… I think that, if he sees you just once, and you tell him to let you be… I think he will. He doesn't listen to me. He doesn't listen to Alakazam. But he WILL listen to you. You just might be able to bring Eusine out of his blind obsession."

"…" Suicune was silent again. She debated what to do in her head. On one hand, she was still completely furious at Eusine for what he did. She didn't know if she could prevent herself from tearing into Eusine's flesh when she saw him. But on the other hand, this could actually end all of Suicune's (and by extension, Alakazam's) troubles with Eusine.

Suicune spoke again. "If I see him, and talk to him, just once… and I tell him to stop his obsession over me and pay more attention to his own Pokémon… you really think that he'll go back to normal?"

"Suicune, if that doesn't work, then nothing will."

"…All right." she reluctantly agreed. "But if he tries to catch me again, I'm out of there."

"Sounds fair enough to me." Entei nodded as the two of them going back to the table. By the time they were done talking, the food was already on the table waiting for them. Alakazam kept quiet about what he had heard, but was very glad Suicune agreed to visit Eusine once everything was over.

* * *

><p>Typhlosion and Victor practically drooled in front of their food when it was served. Never before had they seen, or smelled, anything single food this delicious. The Italian Pizza, to Typhlosion, looked like some sort of masterpiece. It was beautiful to him in an odd way, and the same could be said for Victor's Berry Bowl entrée.<p>

"What are you guys waiting for, the end of the train ride?" Ethan chuckled as he saw the two salivating over the food. "Dig in."

With that, Typhlosion used his right cyborg claw to sharply cut the pizza into edible fourths. All it took was one bite for his taste buds to go to heaven. Swallowing the first bite, he couldn't help but remark on the food. "Wow… I've… never tasted food that good before. I mean, at Team Rocket, we had pizza on Tuesdays but… not THIS pizza. The one they always served tasted kind of… well, like cardboard to put it simply."

"Was working for Team Rocket this bad?" Ethan asked. "You told me that you did work for them… but did you really have to work for barely edible food?"

"It was work or die in there. I already told you; I didn't really have any say in what they did, or what they decided to punish you with…" Typhlosion stopped for a moment. "…But if they caught me again… the consequences would be worse than anything I've ever gone through before. I could be beaten, whipped, tortured, brainwashed if they build that brainwashing machine that we were forced to give them plans for, left to be battered by Giovanni's Ground types… and probably the worst of all, getting shut down.

Ethan hesitated to ask. "What exactly is… getting 'shut down'?"

Typhlosion sighed. He never really liked talking about this, but he thought that Ethan deserved to know. "Umm…" Typhlosion stuttered a bit. "G-Getting s-shut d-down… it's l-like… euthanasia…"

Typhlosion stopped there, not wanting to say anymore. The full impact of what could happen to him truly hit him and everyone else. If he was caught again, he would hit his third strike against Team Rocket. He knew what they would do. No beating, no torture, no brainwashing… they would just shut him down. Then they'd never have to deal with him revolting ever again.

"May I be excused to the cabin?" he asked quietly, lifting up his plate.

Ethan seemed to understand what Typhlosion was going through. "Sure. Just go down a few cars away from the dinner car, and my cabin is number 5."

"Thank you."

Typhlosion left, leaving the rest of the group in silence. Victor, being Typhlosion's friend, knew he couldn't leave Typhlosion alone. "Ethan?" he asked. "May I also…"

"Yes." Ethan said, already knowing what Victor was going to say. Victor thanked the trainer and took his dinner along with him to Ethan's cabin to check on Typhlosion.

* * *

><p><em>7:56 p.m.<em>

Victor walked in to Ethan's cabin, which he quickly realized was the most luxurious cabin on the whole train. Quickly tossing that fact aside, he walked over to the small two-person table he was at and sat down with him. "Hey, Ty."

Typhlosion sighed. "Hi, Victor. Sorry for leaving like that. You know, so suddenly."

"Don't worry about it." he smiled, looking into his eyes. "This whole thing is going to be over soon. We're going to Goldenrod, we're going to get what keeps us bound to Team Rocket removed, and then we're going to be free Pokémon. All of us will confront the police about what Team Rocket's been doing, and they'll be able to take down their operations. You'll never have to worry about Team Rocket or being shut down ever again."

"But that still leaves that psycho cult." Typhlosion depressingly noted to him. "The police aren't going to believe us about some crazy cult. They don't even know that car crash back in Pewter City had ANYTHING related to that cult. They probably don't even know they exist!"

Victor put his hand on Typhlosion's shoulder from across the table. "Ty. Calm down. Didn't I tell you not to worry about it? Once we get this anklet business taken care of, we'll tell the police. And if the police don't believe us, we'll take care of that cult ourselves. With me, you, the Legendary Beasts, Zekrom, Alakazam, Buddy and his trainer, aka the Johto Champion, nothing can stand in our way! …Oh yeah, and Lyra too. I always forget about her for some reason."

Typhlosion chuckled. "I always forget about Lyra, too. She kinda tends to just… you know, be there."

Victor grinned. "I'd have to agree."

"…"

"…"

"…Do you hear something?" Typhlosion asked Victor.

"…No. I don't hear anything besides us talking." Victor answered.

"Just listen. And stay super quiet."

Victor did so. Aside from the rumbling of the train, the two could hear a ticking sound. And it wasn't from the clock.

"What is that sound?" he asked.

"Sounds like some sort of ticking noise. Come on; let's take a look around the cabin." Typhlosion suggested. Victor nodded in agreement as the two investigated the area. Pretty quickly, Victor came across a most unpleasant sight inside the cabinet.

"Uhh… Typhlosion?" he said, his voice nervous.

"Yeah?" he said, still looking around and not noticing his change of tone.

"You… might want to come over here. I found what's making the ticking noise…"

Typhlosion walked over to where Victor was at and peered inside. What he saw horrified him.

"A BOMB?!"

"Shush!" Victor harshly whispered into his ear. "Yes, it's a bomb. Somebody must have planted this while we were at dinner."

"…Those psychos…" they both realized at the same time.

"They want all of us now…" Typhlosion said. "Not just me and Raikou now. They want every single Pokémon in our group to be their mindless drones."

"Not if I have anything to say about it." Victor said, crawling into the cabinet since he was the only one slender enough to fit in.

"VICTOR, ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?!"

"Didn't I just say 'shush'?!" Victor harshly whispered again. "I'm going to stay here and look over the bomb. It's programmed to blow up in 20 minutes, so you go get the rest of the group, bring them here, and inform them of the situation. Get going!" he ordered. Typhlosion, knowing better than to protest at this point, ran out the door and back to the dinner car.

Typhlosion dashed as quickly as his feet would take him to the dinner car, where the rest of the gang was still eating. "Guys!" he exclaimed, catching their attention.

"Oh hey there, Typhlosion." replied Ethan. "Feeling better?"

"Sorta…" he mumbled. "…Wait! What am I saying?! That's not the point! All of you guys gotta to come with me back to your cabin pronto!"

Ethan was a bit surprised at how alarmed Typhlosion was. "Typhlosion? What's the big deal? What's got you all panicked?"

Typhlosion was about to say what it was, before he realized all of the people in the dining car. The last thing Typhlosion needed was for everyone to panic. "I'd tell you, but I don't want to send the whole train into a panic. I'll tell you guys at the cabin."

Ethan looked at him, before rising up out of his chair. "All right, I'll come with you."

Buddy stood up along with his master. "If he goes, I go." he stated simply.

"Zekrom, I need you to come too. It's sort of technology-related." Typhlosion said to him. The Dragon-type Pokémon stopped in the middle of his meal. "If you say so." he said, also standing up. The group departed, leaving Lyra, Alakazam and the Legendary Beasts by themselves.

"Just what the heck is going on?" Suicune had to ask.

"I don't know…" Lyra muttered. "But I think it's for the best if we stay here."

Suicune couldn't help but feel suspicious about what was going on, but shrugged his shoulders. "All right, then." she said, continuing to eat.

The rest of the group dashed to Ethan's cabin, following Typhlosion. "Ty, just why is this all about?" Zekrom questioned as they ran for the cabin.

"I'll tell you when we get there!"

* * *

><p><em>8:07 p.m.<em>

Within a few minutes, the group arrived at Ethan's cabin. Typhlosion opened the door and they headed inside.

"Typhlosion…" Ethan attempted to ask him again.

"OK, now to keep a long story short, we found a bomb implanted in the back of the cabinet. Victor took a look at it and discovered that it's supposed to detonate at 8:20."

"A bomb?!" Buddy exclaimed, startled by the fact that someone would commit a terrorist attack on this train. "But…"

"It's got to be that cult I read about in that book." Ethan realized. "So what do we do?"

"My vote goes to defusing the bomb." said Victor.

"But how do we do that?" Ethan asked. "I might be a powerful Pokémon trainer, but I'm no bomb expert!"

"That's why I brought Zekrom." Typhlosion said. "I'm hoping he has any technological skills that could help us."

All eyes turned to Zekrom as he spoke. He chuckled nervously. "Unfortunately, I'm not a bomb expert… but I have studied a few types of bombs. I might be able to figure out what it is." He stopped talking for a moment to look around and find a pair of wire cutters he found lying around in a drawer. "Victor?"

"Yes?" he nodded.

Zekrom tossed the wire cutters to the Infernape, which he caught with dexterity.

"If the bomb's in that cabinet, you're the only one slender enough to fit in there. You'll have to describe the bomb to me, and I might be able to remember how to defuse it. I've studied a few types of bombs ever since… Reshiram…"

Everyone was silent for a brief moment, with Victor in particular remembering the story Zekrom had told him and Typhlosion about Reshiram.

"Anyway, we don't have any time to linger. Victor, I need you to crawl into the cabinet. DO NOT CUT ANY WIRES UNTIL I TELL YOU TO. I can't emphasize that enough. I'll stay outside to instruct you on which wires to cut after you give me the description." Zekrom then turned to face the others. "As for you guys, get out of here. I don't want you guys getting hurt or even killed if something goes wrong."

"Are you sure?" Buddy asked. "We can't do anything to help?"

"I'm afraid there isn't. There's no point in you guys staying here. Grab Lyra and the others and get as far away from this car as possible."

"…Understood, Zekrom." Ethan said, quickly running out the door with Buddy. Zekrom noticed that Typhlosion didn't go with them.

"What are you waiting for, Typhlosion? Get out of here!" Zekrom ordered.

"…No." the cyborg protested. "I don't care if my life is in danger; I'm not leaving Victor. If he gets blown up, I get blown up with him."

"But Ty…"

"I'm sorry, Zekrom." Typhlosion said. "But I'm not leaving."

"OK, fine. You can be that way." Zekrom said, still unhappy about Typhlosion not leaving. "Just stay to the side."

Typhlosion did so, sitting on the side of the cabin, looking at the two. Victor started to crawl into the cabinet, making his way towards the explosive, with Zekrom just outside the cabinet.

"You see the bomb?" Zekrom asked.

"Yeah! It's set to blow up in 10 more minutes!" Victor answered.

"All right, describe what the bomb looks like. I need to know its' appearance."

Victor analyzed the explosive device. "It's grayish… shaped like a sphere… and very metallic-looking!"

Zekrom thought about the type of bomb Victor described. It sounded familiar. "Grayish… spherical… metallic…"

Then it occurred to him. That was the exactly same type of bomb Reshiram had on her 6 years ago. The one that Giovanni showed him in that picture. Painful memories went through his mind.

Losing her.

Feeling that devastation.

Believing that she was OK.

And discovering what had truly happened to her.

Zekrom briefly fell to the ground, trying to stay on track.

"Reshiram…" he muttered.

Typhlosion could tell something was wrong. "Zekrom… are you OK?"

"I'm FINE!" he shouted at the cyborg, lashing out because of his stress. Typhlosion backed off after that.

"Zekrom, focus! We have 7 minutes left!" Victor shouted back at him, hearing him yell at Typhlosion. "What type of bomb is it and how do I defuse it?!"

Zekrom started to get his mind back on track. He thought about the appearance of the bomb. He knew what type of bomb it was, but needed to know the model as well. The bomb on Reshiram was a v1.0 model of a special bomb illegally manufactured in the long-abandoned Kanto Power Plant, known as the 'Gray Bomber'.

"Does it say 'Gray Bomber' on the bomb anywhere?" Zekrom asked.

Victor looked it over again before finding text in a glossy black declaring the type of bomb. "Yeah, it says 'Gray Bomber' on here!"

"What about the model?"

"It says v1.1 on here."

Zekrom grit his teeth. While the bomb Zekrom remembered and the bomb in the train were the same type of bomb, their models were different. The wiring and even what wires needed to be cut to defuse it could be different, or it could be the same.

"Victor. You need to know something. I only have knowledge of the v1.0 model. I don't know if the wiring is different for the v1.1 model, so I'm going to have to rely on my knowledge of the v1.0 model. …And I might be wrong on the wires you need to cut. You could get blown up."

"Understood." Victor said almost immediately. "Tell me what wires you think I should cut. We have 5 minutes left."

Typhlosion couldn't help but be absolutely amazed by Victor's courage here. He stood a good chance of accidentally setting off the bomb, and yet he was willing to risk his life to defuse it. And since he was directly in front of the bomb, he would take the full-force of the blast, which would seal his death.

Zekrom got down to business. "Unscrew the top of the bomb to reveal the wiring underneath. Remember, to unscrew it, turn it counterclockwise."

Victor did so. "I got the top off." he replied.

"How many wires do you see and what are their colors?"

Victor looked it over. "There are six wires. They're red, yellow, green, blue, orange, and purple."

Zekrom thought it over. "Those are the exact same colors in the v1.0 model… I just hope they didn't switch up the wiring." he silently prayed.

"OK." said Zekrom speaking up. "You need to cut the wires in the correct order, or it'll explode."

"Mind telling me that order, Zekrom? We only have 3 minutes!"

"First, cut the orange wire."

Victor snipped it with the wire cutters. "Got it."

"Then, cut the green wire."

Victor also cut it. "So far, so good. But the timer's still going with 2 minutes!"

Zekrom maintained his cool. "Now, cut the purple wire."

Victor spliced the wire once more with the cutters. "Got it! Things look good!"

"Now, listen closely Victor. Grab the blue and red wires. The blue wire keeps the timer going. The red wire operates the 'output' of the bomb. You need to cut both of those at the exact same time. That will deactivate the bomb. But if there's even a 1 second difference between cutting those two wires, it'll blow up. Leave the yellow wire alone. Doing that should stop the bomb…"

"…I hope." he silently whispered the last part to himself.

"Understood." he said again, this time much more gravely. Grabbing both the blue and red wires, he placed them both underneath the wire cutters and…

*snip*

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

I am a horrible person. I am a horrible, horrible human being for leaving this on such a dramatic cliffhanger. But I had to. Hope you guys liked this one, and don't forget to read and review!


	24. Collapse

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 24: Collapse

* * *

><p>*snip*<p>

"…"

"…That… that worked… right?" Zekrom asked to Victor, extremely nervous all the while. Typhlosion was breathing rapidly, terrified.

"I… I think it-"

*BEEP* *BEEP* *BEEPBEEPBEEPBEBEBEBEBEBEBE*

Both of their eyes' widened. Victor just had a split-second to react and cover the bomb with his left arm. Immediately after, the bomb exploded, with Victor's entire left arm taking the powerful brunt of it. The explosion blew him back to the opposite side of the cabin, his head hitting the back wall with so much force that some blood spattered out onto it and denting his head. He collapsed, unconscious on the other side.

"VICTOR!" Typhlosion screamed in panic. He ran over immediately to Victor's side, analyzing him for damage. Zekrom looked back to where the bomb had been. The entire cabinet the bomb was in had blown to pieces, with splinters and chunks of wood all over the cabinet, some even thrown in Typhlosion's fur, causing him to bleed quite heavily as well. But the pure adrenaline pumping through Typhlosion's veins and circuits neutralized any pain he felt, only having concern for Victor at that moment.

Typhlosion looked over Victor, tears pouring from his eyes as he tried desperately to fight them off. The damage done was severe, and miraculously, the Infernape was still clinging to life, if only by a thread. The cyborg's eyes wandered over to Victor's left arm… which was about ten feet away from the body, with the bone inside splitting out. Looking at the shoulder of his friend, Typhlosion could see that the left arm was blown clean off, leaving the socket to bleed heavily.

"N-No… you can't… you can't die on me now." Typhlosion cried. "Not after all we've been through." He gathered some paper towels and tried to use them to clot the massive amount of blood.

At that moment, Ethan, Lyra, Buddy, Alakazam, and the Legendary Beasts came running in. As Ethan got inside, he was left frozen in shock of the situation in front of him. He was speechless as he saw everything. The blown up cabinet. The chunks of wood everywhere. A seriously injured Typhlosion. And a critically injured Infernape, missing an arm.

Lyra couldn't take the sight of the graphic scene, and even Buddy was feeling a little queasy. "Umm… E-Ethan? Do you mind if I just step…?"

"Go ahead." he told them. "Ask the train conductor how soon we'll get to Goldenrod while you're out."

Lyra nodded, and she left along with Buddy, who didn't want the blood to remind him of the scars he committed against Typhlosion earlier.

Alakazam looked around, amazed at the damage caused by the bomb. "This cult really isn't kidding. They're dead serious."

Raikou looked at Typhlosion, who jerked a bit in nervousness at Alakazam's word choice. "…LeT's nOt UsE tHe wOrD, 'dEAd'."

"…Agreed." Alakazam said, hovering over to Typhlosion and the unconscious Victor. "Typhlosion? Can you step aside so I can use Recover to help heal his wounds?"

Typhlosion complied immediately, backing off so Alakazam could have room to perform his work. Alakazam pulled out his hand, using his healing powers to help stop the massive bleeding. After a minute or so of application, the bleeding started to clot. Typhlosion sighed in relief, thinking that things would be alright now.

"Don't relax yet." Alakazam warned. "He's still lost a lot of blood. We need to get him to a Pokémon Center as soon as we can."

"How far it is to Goldenrod City from here, anyway?" Suicune felt compelled to ask.

"I honestly don't know. I don't know if we can get Victor there in time…"

"…Alakazam?" Typhlosion said.

"Yeah?"

"Can't you teleport? You can take us all to Goldenrod City, right?"

"I'm… not the best teleporter around. That's why we all took the train. I can't teleport a whole lot of people." Alakazam chuckled nervously.

"I can speak about his amateur teleporting skills from personal experience." Entei snarked playfully, trying to help lighten the mood.

"…But I think I can handle 2 or 3 people or Pokémon. I've been to Goldenrod before with Eusine, so I can teleport there. The less passengers, the better."

Ethan came up with an idea. "Alakazam. Can you teleport yourself, Victor, and Typhlosion to the Goldenrod City Pokémon Center? I can catch up to you later when the train arrives. It's important for you to take the two most injured Pokémon there as fast as possible."

Typhlosion looked at Zekrom. "But… what about…?"

"Don't worry about me." the Legendary Dragon reassured the cyborg. "My skin armor is very tough. Those chunks of wood didn't even scratch me."

"…All right." Typhlosion nodded. "Should I grab Victor's left arm?" he asked, looking at the arm with the bone splintering out.

Ethan walked over to the blown off arm, soaked in blood and the main bone shattered irreparably into two. As he picked it up, the skin crumbled to pieces, leaving him holding only the two shattered bones. "Well… I'm no medical expert, but I think this arm is gone for good. You guys just go ahead. We can worry about this later."

Typhlosion almost threw up at the sight of Victor's arm disintegrating in front of him. Regardless, he nodded, and picked up Victor's unconscious body. Alakazam started to glow pink, as did Typhlosion and Victor. A couple of seconds later, the three vanished, on their way to Goldenrod City…

* * *

><p>The trio quickly arrived in front of the Goldenrod City Pokémon Center. Typhlosion, holding his best friend, wasted no time in running inside with Alakazam. Nearly all of the Pokémon Center's residents stared at the critically injured Infernape the Typhlosion was holding. Nurse Joy #19, seeing the situation, wasted absolutely no time to call in a Chansey with a gurney. Typhlosion and Nurse Joy worked together to get the Infernape onto the gurney, with Chansey quickly rolling the Infernape away to the Emergency Room. Just then, did she notice the bad shape the Typhlosion himself was in.<p>

"Oh my goodness!" she exclaimed. "All those chunks of woods are in your fur, too! And you're also bleeding quite badly!"

"Please, ma'am. Don't worry about it." Typhlosion said, brushing off the comment. But before Typhlosion could protest, Nurse Joy led him by the arm to get to an Operating Room, where they could remove all of the chunks of wood stuck in him. That only left Alakazam in the front of the Pokémon Center, nervously waiting how the two would turn out…

* * *

><p>Back on the train bound to Goldenrod City, the train conductor had been alerted to the scene of the bombing. He helped to assist Ethan, Zekrom and the Legendary Beasts to clean up the remaining chunks of wood.<p>

"Champion Ethan, I apologize for what has happened. I don't possibly know how something so dreadful could happen in your cabin. Thank goodness you're alright." the conductor said, extremely worried.

"That's not what we need to worry about now. Just make sure this train gets to Goldenrod City as fast as possible. Thanks for helping me, but I'll finish up cleaning." Ethan told him.

"Uh, if you insist sir." he nodded, quickly leaving the cabin. He rushed his way past Lyra and Buddy, still outside the cabin. The female companion and the Water-type Pokémon looked at each other, both nervous about the situation at hand. Finally, Lyra spoke up.

"This is really unbelievable, isn't it?" she muttered.

"It is." Buddy agreed. "To tell you the truth, Lyra… I'm scared. I really am."

"…But you never seem to be afraid of anything with Ethan by your side."

Buddy shook his head. "Not this time. I've dealt with Team Rocket before, but… I fully admit it. These crazy cult guys scare me much more than Team Rocket. They're willing to bomb a train cabin just to try to capture us and make us all into crazy cyborg slaves. It's honestly a horrifying thought. Did you see Victor?"

Lyra nodded.

"They're more than capable of that kind of violence. They'll kill anyone who gets in the way of their goal. And that's why these guys clearly have it out for us. And knowing what they're capable of… it scares me to think of what they're going to do next. We have to be more careful than ever now."

"…Do you think Victor will be OK?" Lyra couldn't help but ask.

"…I don't know." Buddy answered, using only three small, yet powerful words.

Ethan came outside to talk to Buddy and Lyra. "Are you guys doing OK?" he asked.

"…We're fine." Lyra said. "We were just talking."

"Well, the cabin's cleaned up now. I think we should all head inside to talk about what we should do."

"…I couldn't agree more, Ethan." Buddy sighed, walking into the cabin with his master and Lyra following. The entire group sat down on the sides of the cabin, with the cabin still covered by small splinters of wood.

"…This is getting serious, isn't it?" Entei sighed.

"eVeN mOrE tHaN eVeR BeFoRe, eNtEi." Raikou sighed as well, with a robotic synthesizer still in his voice.

"Lyra, do you know how much longer the train conductor said it would take to get to Goldenrod?" Ethan asked. "I should've asked him when he came over, but it slipped my mind."

"…Well, when Buddy and I went to go get him, he told us it would be 30 minutes until we reached Goldenrod. After that, we fessed up about the bomb scenario, and he came immediately over here with us."

"…I see." Ethan said, nodding solemnly.

"So, we're just supposed to wait here?" Suicune sighed.

"Unfortunately, that's all we can do, Suicune." Ethan reminded her. "But once we get to Goldenrod City, we'll split into two groups. Raikou, Buddy, and I will head to Bill's house. Lyra, Zekrom, Entei, and you will head over to the Pokémon Center to check on the others. Once Bill gets done with Raikou, we'll take him to the Pokémon Center so he can work with Typhlosion and Victor as well. You OK with that?"

Suicune sighed again, understanding what Ethan meant. "If that's our only option, I guess I'll have to comply."

* * *

><p>Back at the Goldenrod City Pokémon Center, Alakazam looked around on the table in front of him. He saw one of the Pokémon Center's magazines to read and try to pass the time. Flipping through the magazine, he didn't find anything interesting in the Pokémon analysis titled 'The Pitiful Life of a Magikarp'.<p>

"When are they going to call me?" Alakazam groaned, a bit anxious over the scenario.

"Mr. Alakazam?" the Nurse Joy up at the front said.

His ears perked up at the mention of his species name. Since there weren't any other Alakazams in the Pokémon Center, Nurse Joy had to be referring to him. He walked up to the counter.

"Did you call for me?"

"Yes. It's about the two patients you brought in."

"And…?" Alakazam urged her, anxious to hear the news.

"The Typhlosion was OK after some minor surgery to remove those wood chunks. He's bandaged up and lying in a bed right now. The Infernape, however… suffered from much more severe damage."

"He's… still going to live though, right?" Alakazam asked, knowing that Typhlosion would be crushed if his best friend died on him.

"He's going to make it, fortunately."

Alakazam sighed in relief.

"But… he had some very severe head trauma. He's very lucky to be alive and not in a coma. He's going to go without his left arm for the rest of his life unless a prosthetic replacement is used. Or something of the sort. He also has a minor case of retrograde amnesia."

"…Retrograde amnesia?"

"After surgery was done, we tried asking him if he knew anything at all, but he didn't even seem to remember his own name. After another test, we found out about his case of retrograde amnesia due to the head trauma. Fortunately, it isn't permanent, and should clear up."

"In how long?"

The Nurse Joy sweated nervously. "We… uhh… don't know how long. It's different for every individual. It could be from a few hours minimum to a month or two maximum."

Alakazam's eyes widened in fear. "A MONTH OR TWO?! WE DON'T…" Looking around slowly, he toned down his voice when other Pokémon Center patients stared at him. "…Sorry."

"You can go see him if you wish. Both of them are still in their beds recovering, but I can take you to see them."

"Please do." Alakazam requested. "Let me check on the Infernape."

Nurse Joy nodded. "Yes, of course. This way, sir." she said, leading him to the back of the Pokémon Center. Alakazam couldn't help but wonder how many times he and the group has had to go to Pokémon Center for treatment of severe injuries. Eventually, the two arrived at a room.

"Here you are." the Nurse Joy said, starting to leave. "Let me know if you need anything."

"I will." he said back to her. Slowly, he opened the door.

As he walked inside, he couldn't help but look at Victor. His eyes were half-open, and he was miraculously still alive. Alakazam shut the door behind him and sat next to the Infernape. The Infernape very slowly turned his head to face the guest. "H-Hey." he said weakly.

"Hi." the Alakazam replied, starting off with a basic conversation. "How are you?"

"Umm… I think I just came out of surgery… that's what the nurse told me, at least…"

Alakazam nodded. "Do you remember who you are?"

The Infernape closed his eyes, trying to think. "Umm… uhh… I remember some things."

"Can you tell me what you do remember?" Alakazam gently asked him.

"I'll try. Umm… I… I remember working for some sort of organization for a long time…"

"That would be Team Rocket."

"Really?" the Infernape replied in surprise. "I don't know why anyone would ever work for them. Aren't they evil?"

_"Good, he truly does seem to remember some things." _Alakazam thought. "Do you remember anything else?" Alakazam verbally asked.

"I remember that I had a friend. A very close friend. He… he was a Typhlosion, right?"

Alakazam nodded.

"A-And something to him while we were younger. What… what was it? Something…"

The Infernape paused for a moment, zoned out and now stuck in a trance. Alakazam decided to interfere.

"Excuse me." Alakazam said.

"Oh… right. I'm sorry. I don't remember what happened to him." the Infernape's mind wandered off again, looking at the small stub for an arm he had left. "Was I always without a left arm?"

Alakazam groaned. His patience was being tested, but he knew that he had to stay calm. "Please focus. Do you remember anything about yourself?"

The Infernape closed his eyes again. "I… I had a nickname, right?"

Alakazam nodded. "Do you remember what your name was?"

"Uhh… let me think… Hector… Lector… Nick… Vic… wait. I got it. It's Victor, right?"

"Yes. You're on a roll. Keep going."

"Uhh…" Victor closed his eyes, trying to think again. "…I still can't remember what happened to that Typhlosion friend. Or why I'm missing an arm. Did something happen?"

Before Alakazam could answer for him, the door creaked open. Typhlosion walked inside, nervously at first, but then relaxed once he saw Victor up and awake. "Hey! Victor! You're alright!"

Victor stared at Typhlosion's face. "I… I know you. Are… are you that friend?" he said, trying hard to form the sentence.

"…W-Wait. Victor, what are you talking about?" Typhlosion wondered, confused and unaware of Victor's condition.

"Y-You're that friend. That friend that I've been friends with since we were little, right?"

"…Yeah. What are you getting at?"

"I… I think I…" Victor stopped for a moment, looking at Typhlosion's cybernetics. "Umm… what happened to you? What's with all the robotic stuff? Did… did you get hurt, too?"

Typhlosion's eyes widened. He realized that something was clearly wrong. He looked to Alakazam. "Alakazam. What's going on here? Why doesn't he remember me clearly? Is it… because of…?"

Alakazam nodded. "The nurse said that Victor has a case of retrograde amnesia. It's not permanent, but they don't know how long it will last."

Typhlosion gasped quietly. "S-So… does that mean that he doesn't know…?"

Alakazam shook his head. "No. I asked him about you, and he remembered who you were. He remembered his own name, and the fact that you were his childhood friend. But he seems to have forgotten about your cybernetics."

"Cybernetics?" Victor questioned. "Are that what those are?"

Typhlosion was just ready to give up at that point. He had nearly had enough of all of the drama that's had to happen. Finding out that he was some sort of leader for an insane cult obsessed with cybernetic assimilation was only the start of it. And then Raikou got brainwashed, putting Typhlosion under even more stress over worrying about him. Then they had to escape from Team Rocket. And it would only be a few hours before the anklets activated anyway and poisoned him, Victor, and Raikou, leaving them to die a slow, painful death. And now Victor lost his memory from a bomb planted by that insane cult. It was becoming more than he could bear.

"…Typhlosion?" Alakazam asked.

"…Just… go get Bill. Please. Just… get him to come over here and at least fix one thing in this screwed up life I'm stuck in."

"…But… Ethan wanted us to…"

"PLEASE!" Typhlosion yelled, on the verge of crying. "I CAN'T ANYMORE OF THIS DRAMA! I'VE HAD ENOUGH! PLEASE! JUST MAKE IT ALL STOP!"

Alakazam looked at Typhlosion, familiar with the pain of life going wrong and getting screwed over at every opportunity. "…I understand."

With those words, Alakazam teleported away. And as Typhlosion was left alone…

He wept.

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Yep. This chapter's a big game changer. But fear not, everything will work out in the end for Typhlosion and company. Sometimes, through suffering, we are made stronger.

As always, read and review.


	25. Recovery

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 25: Recovery

* * *

><p>Typhlosion sighed. He looked at Victor, who at the moment, was napping and trying to get some much-needed rest. It really amazed him at what Victor did to save the entire train, even if Victor himself couldn't remember it. He willingly risked his life to defuse that bomb and protect everyone on the train. And even when defusing it failed, he took the full brunt of the explosion. There was no doubt in his mind that Victor also saved Typhlosion's own life. He could only hope this retrograde amnesia would be over sooner rather than later.<p>

A faint beeping noise came from Typhlosion, which stirred Victor up from his gentle sleep. He was fully awake now, but made no visible sign of it to Typhlosion. Hearing the beeping noise, Typhlosion sighed, pressing a button on the side of his metallic pack. The GPS and status screen came up again, informing him that his battery pack power was down to 10%.

"Great." he muttered. "Just when I didn't need any more drama. I think I still have that spare battery pack I took a few days ago on my first assignment with Raikou…"

He thought the events over again. So much had happened within the time span of just a few days. Meeting Raikou, his first mission with the Legendary Beasts, discovering a cult dedicated to converting Pokémon into cyborgs, Raikou himself getting converted into one, trying to reverse the effects… really, the list just went on and on. Really, he couldn't help but think of it as a miracle that he hadn't gone insane. Hopefully, this was all going to be over soon.

Typhlosion attempted to grab the battery pack, but it was rather far down into the metallic pack, and his hands wouldn't reach. He groaned to himself. "Am I really going to have to do a handstand again just to get the dumb thing out?"

As Typhlosion was busy struggling simply to get the battery pack out, he didn't notice Victor slowly crawling out of the bed, and approaching it.

"Victor?" he asked. "What are you doing?"

Not saying anything, Victor reached deep into Typhlosion's pack with the only hand he had left and grabbed the battery pack. He then gave it to Typhlosion.

"H-Here you go." Victor said, smiling.

"T-Thank you…"

Typhlosion found himself looking deep into Victor's eyes before he even touched the retrieved battery pack. It was absolutely fascinating. He had only performed such a simple favor, something that anybody could have done. But why did this one small favor coming from Victor mean nearly the entire world to Typhlosion?

_"Maybe…" _he thought. _"Maybe it's because he still really does know who I am. He hobbled out of his own bed in critical condition, simply to grab something I couldn't reach. Memory lost or not, he still cares about me."_

Typhlosion smiled a bit, swapping the nearly dead battery pack in his chest for a fully charged one, bringing the battery level of his functioning cyborg parts back to 100%. He dropped the nearly dead battery back into his pack, and put up his GPS and status screen.

Sitting back down, his brief thoughts of happiness were disrupted when he saw the metal anklet still on both his and Victor's feet. He looked at a clock on the wall.

"9:10 p.m. 2 hours and 50 minutes until these things activate." he muttered to himself. "The train's probably running behind due to the bomb attack. I just hope that Alakazam and everyone else get here soon…"

* * *

><p><em>9:12 p.m.<em>

Alakazam found himself wandering through the massive streets of Goldenrod City. He had visited Goldenrod City before with Eusine to meet Bill, but it had been such a long time that he didn't remember where Bill's house was. He couldn't afford to simply wait for Ethan to arrive, so he simply resumed his search.

"If only I had some sort of clue as to where in this giant city Bill lived…" he muttered to himself. "He's probably in the suburb area, since that is where most people live in Goldenrod. Better check it out." He then teleported to the suburb area to save time.

Arriving in the suburbs, Alakazam groaned in annoyance at how all of the houses looked exactly the same. "Great. This'll take forever."

Passing by the first house, he noted that absolutely nothing distinguished the houses, except for a sign in the front. Alakazam looked at it, reading the board.

"Conner's house"

Alakazam looked around the area again, seeing that all of the houses had signs like this in front of them. If he could just find the sign that said "Bill's house", then he'd have him.

"This might be easier than I thought." he noted promisingly.

* * *

><p><em>9:22 p.m.<em>

It only took Alakazam about 10 minutes of traversing through the suburbs to find Bill's house. And much to Alakazam's delight, the lights in the house were on, meaning that he was home. He quickly levitated his body to the front door of the house and knocked on it.

After a few moments of agonizingly waiting, a man came to the front door and answered it. His brown hair and brown eyes along with his eagerness to always invent and try new things made him stand out in Alakazam's mind. Formerly, he lived at the Sea Cottage near Cerulean City, but has since moved to Goldenrod to assist with his parents in their old age. Bill himself was surprised at what he saw.

"Eusine's Alakazam? What are you here?"

"I don't have time to explain right now. Right now, I've got to teleport you to the Pokémon Center as fast as I can."

Bill wanted to help Alakazam, but being the curious spirit that he always was, he was compelled to ask about it.

"Why do you need my help?" he asked, putting on a coat to show that he was preparing to leave anyway, regardless of Alakazam's answer.

"You're an expert on technology and security, right?"

Bill nodded. "Of course. I spent my entire life studying it."

"Well… here's the deal." Alakazam said. "I have three friends that have managed to bust out of Team Rocket's headquarters."

"Team Rocket?" Bill asked in confused. "I thought Ethan had already disposed of them when they had plans to bring back Giovanni… The only things I recalled were a couple of crimes such as Looker's murder, but there was no trace of evidence left since the scene of the crime was burnt to the ground. Was that really…?"

"Yep, they're back. They've been at this for a number of years after Ethan initially disbanded the group, and now, they've managed to keep things under wraps much better this time."

"I see what you're saying, but where do I come in?"

"Team Rocket's come up with security measures to make sure none of their captured Pokémon flee. There's a metal anklet of sorts attached to their Pokémon once they're caught. If you leave the base and don't return by midnight, a poison in the anklet injects itself into the bloodstream, slowly killing the Pokémon. The only cure is back at Team Rocket's HQ. Long story short, the point I'm trying to make is that I need your help to take off these anklets off of my friends who managed to escape. And we only have two and a half hours."

Bill, realizing the severity of the situation, nodded. "I gotcha. Just let me get my hacking tools from upstairs."

Bill left to head up the stairs, scouring and searching for every piece of hacking equipment that could be of use. He walked slowly down the stairs so he wouldn't slip and drop the giant pile of stuff he had. He soon made his way to Alakazam.

"All right, Alakazam. Just teleport us to where your friends are, and I'll get to work."

Alakazam nodded, grabbing Bill's hand as they both glowed with a pink light. As the pink glow surrounding them intensified, the two vanished from the house.

* * *

><p><em>9:27 p.m.<em>

Alakazam and Bill instantly teleported into the room where Typhlosion and Victor resided. Victor didn't seem to react while Typhlosion was caught off guard.

"Whoa!" he exclaimed, startled by the entrance of the two. He looked up at the human that Alakazam came in with. "A-Alakazam? I-Is that…?"

Alakazam nodded, with a smile on his face. "This is indeed Bill, the technological genius of Johto."

"Well, Kanto actually. I spent most of my life there before moving to Goldenrod to help my family… but I'm going off track. Alakazam already told me what's going on. Can you guys show me your metal anklets so that I can get to work?"

Typhlosion, all too willing to oblige, set his foot out from the chair he was sitting on to put his foot on a foot rest. Victor was slightly confused, but did the same, extending his foot so Bill could access both of their anklets.

"I'll get right to work." Bill declared, setting his hacking tools down on a nearby table. He approached Typhlosion first, though Typhlosion insisted that his friend should be treated first.

"Are you sure?"

Typhlosion nodded with absolute certainty. "Yes. If he can risk his life to save an entire train from a terrorist attack, then he absolutely deserves to be treated first."

Bill wasn't sure what Typhlosion meant by 'saving an entire train from a terrorist attack', but didn't have the time to question it. Instead, he immediately hooked up his equipment to Victor, which included his laptop with internet connection, a code de-scrambler, and a hex code timing system. The code de-scrambler would allow Bill to discover the 16-character code needed to unlock the anklet. With the code de-scrambler and laptop hooked up, he looked through the system for a code.

The security precautions taken with these anklets were truly impressive. The anklet did not have one permanent 'set' code, but a code that changed in real time, one code per second. Taking the code for the current time (which was currently 9:40:07 p.m.), he hooked up the hex code timing system to Victor's anklet, to search for a matching code that happened before midnight. As a miracle would have it, the exact same code would generate itself at the time of 10:03:43 p.m. that night. All Bill would have to do now would be to press ENTER on his keyboard at that exact time to input the code to unlock the anklet.

"Whoa." Victor marveled at the sight of all of the technology. "That's really interesting."

"It is, isn't it?" Bill chuckled. "Hold on a second." Before Bill took any sort of break, he set a timer on his laptop for 10:03:43 exactly. He then would command the computer hacking program to press the ENTER key at that exact time.

"And… done." Bill said, leaving the laptop on the table. He turned towards Typhlosion. "Typhlosion, I'll get to you as soon as Victor is done."

"Understood." Typhlosion nodded.

"If you'll pardon me, I need to go use the bathroom." he said, politely excusing himself and leaving the three Pokémon alone.

* * *

><p><em>9:45 p.m.<em>

The three Pokémon were left alone for quite some time. Victor was silent as he took a nap to rest his body. Typhlosion looked at the clock. "Alakazam, when do you think the others will get here?" he couldn't help but ask.

"I don't know. That bombing probably did delay the train by quite a bit, but it has been 45 minutes since the train was supposed to originally arrive."

"…"

"…Typhlosion?"

"I just hope I can fix things for Raikou and Zekrom, too. At least, before it's too late."

"Oh yeah, that's right…" Alakazam muttered, remembering that Raikou and Zekrom still had anklets keeping them enslaved.

"…I just hope they get here soon…" Typhlosion said silently to himself.

* * *

><p><em>9:50 p.m.<em>

The transit train due for Goldenrod had finally arrived at the city, 50 minutes later than planned. During the ride, the police finally became competent for once and managed to figure out who bombed the room. At arrival, the cult member was arrested and taken in for questioning at Goldenrod's police station. Ethan was glad that the train finally arrived, though he would have to hurry to the Pokémon Center as fast as he could. He had also already recalled the Legendaries (bar Zekrom) to their Pokéballs to deal with less hassle at the Pokémon Center. Once the metal anklet mishaps was all cleared up, he planned to back to the police station to see if he could get any more info.

_"But that's going to have to wait." _Ethan thought to himself as he made his way and dashed into the Pokémon Center. Lyra and Zekrom followed closely behind. Surprisingly, it wasn't the massive black Legendary Dragon that caught everyone's attention in the Pokémon Center. No, it was the fact that Johto Champion Ethan was here.

"Oh crap." muttered Ethan, seeing all of the fangirls and even fanboys of his attempting to run towards him for an autograph, his cap, his underwear… really anything.

"Don't touch a hair on my Master's head!" Buddy roared ferociously to the fans, shielding Ethan. "Unless you want to be torn apart and eaten by me ALIVE, you'd best back off!"

At that suggestion, most of the fans ran outside of the Pokémon Center, screaming bloody murder. Buddy couldn't help but chuckle at the chaos.

"I apologize, Mr. Champion, about all of the… fans." the local Nurse Joy muttered.

"Don't worry about it. That's not important right now. Do you have an Alakazam who came in with a Typhlosion and an Infernape?"

"Yes, we do." Nurse Joy nodded. "Just follow me into the back." she said, walking towards the hallway where patients would stay.

* * *

><p><em>10:00 p.m.<em>

Ethan and company followed the Nurse Joy until she led them to a room. She opened the room to reveal not only the Alakazam, Typhlosion, and Infernape from before, but also a human…

"Bill? What are you doing here?"

Bill has just gotten back from the bathroom a few moments ago, and looked up at Ethan in surprise. Of course, in Alakazam's rush to bring Bill to the Pokémon Center, he neglected to mention that they were travelling with Ethan.

"I was about to ask you the same thing, Ethan."

"Why don't I let all of you guys be?" said the Nurse Joy, leaving the room to go back to attending the front.

"Again, what are you doing here?" Ethan asked again. "I was planning to come get you after I checked up on these three right here."

"Well, Alakazam apparently decided to take charge and get to me first. And it seems he forgot to mention his travelling buddy, the Johto Champion."

Ethan chuckled a bit. "Bill. Seriously, we're friends. I never cared for all of that formal 'Champion' title. Just stick with Ethan."

"All right, Ethan." Bill said with a smile on his face. "You'll be happy to know that I can get those anklets off."

"YOU REALLY CAN?!" yelled an excited Zekrom, waking up the whole hospital. Both Bill and Ethan had to cover their ears to protect from any hearing loss. "Uhh… Zekrom? Inside voice?" Ethan told him.

"…Oh. Heh. Sorry. Just glad to know that this whole thing can finally be over."

"I know how you feel." Typhlosion mentioned.

"Oh, wait a second." Ethan remembered. "Let me get out the others." Grabbing his belt, he tossed three Pokéballs into the air to let out all three of the Legendary Beasts.

"Feels nice to be out of there." Entei said.

"Yeah, no kidding." chuckled Suicune.

The trio of Legendary Beasts looked at the man in front of them, recognizing him as the gadget genius who constructed the PC Storage System, Bill.

"…iT iS CeRTaiNLy NiCe tO mEEt yOu, BiLL." Raikou said.

Bill was a bit startled at first by the appearance of the Legendary Beasts, but quickly recovered himself. "So, they're back with you, huh Ethan?"

"Yep. Anyway, let's cut the small talk right now. Did you…?"

"The hacking and removal tools are all set up. In fact, the Infernape's anklet should snap off soon with the automatic timer.

Just a few seconds later, a click was heard and Victor's anklet was loosened. Before anyone else could do it, Typhlosion grabbed the anklet and immediately tossed it out the window in anger of absolutely everything he and Victor had been through. Walking over to him, Typhlosion smiled, hugging his still sleeping friend. Everyone there couldn't help but feel good, knowing that the freedom of the enslaved Pokémon was almost here. Typhlosion slumped back down into his chair, happy to have his friend free.

"Are we ready to continue?" Bill asked. The other three Pokémon with anklets still on nodded. "All right, then. I'll get back to it."

* * *

><p>An hour and a half went by, though the clock seemed to tick painfully slow to the anklet wearers. Looking at the clock, he saw that it was 11:40, just 20 minutes before the poison would activate. Raikou and Zekrom already had their anklets removed, as Typhlosion insisted to go last. Currently, he was waiting for the codes to match up at 11:58 on the dot. Having the match up code coinciding just two minutes before the poison's activation was nerve-wrecking, to be sure.<p>

* * *

><p><em>11:55 p.m.<em>

15 minutes passed by, though every second seemed to be a minute and every minute seemed to be an hour. He looked at the devices attached to his anklet. He hoped this worked. No, he PRAYED that this would work. Every second was so agonizingly slow, that Typhlosion just wanted to rip all of his fur out. He was so caught up in his nerves that he didn't even notice the anklet snap off.

"I just wish this would end already." he muttered.

"Uh, Typhlosion." Bill said.

"I mean, I don't how much longer I can take this."

"Typhlosion, the anklet's off."

"I almost wish that I actually see if I will… wait. What?"

Typhlosion looked down. Indeed, the anklet had snapped off. Grabbing it, he couldn't believe that this was real. All of the chaos that had happened today had finally come to an end. He could also see a vile, green liquid from the interior of the anklet, no doubt the poison that would have slowly killed him. He even noticed the small needle peering out of a small hole in the metal, as if anticipating to kill its' wearer. He took the metal anklet, and tossed his out the window as well, never wanting to see it again. He was left speechless after all this time. After so many years of being a slave to Team Rocket. After so many years of being a soldier to only further Team Rocket's goals. After so many years of being forced to commit heinous acts of thievery and even murder… he was finally free.

"Now… Zekrom?" Typhlosion asked the Legendary Dragon.

"…Yes?"

"…Tomorrow, we will go back to the Ruins of Alph. And we will free your loved one."

Zekrom couldn't help but get caught up in the moment. Right then and there, he broke down crying. Not with tears of sadness, but with tears of happiness.

Everyone's 'Happily Ever After' was almost in reach. But not if the cult's leader has anything to say about it.

* * *

><p><em>Pokemon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Whoo! Yes! Finally got this done! I am beyond happy to get this to you guys. As always, and please, read and review!


	26. Unchained

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 26: Unchained

* * *

><p>"Ohh… man, we've been through a lot."<p>

Zekrom ended up waking in the middle of the night, mumbling to himself. Right now, it was 2 in the morning, and he really couldn't go back to sleep. Walking around the room, he found himself reflecting on what had happened. It was still hard to believe that he was free from Team Rocket's slavery after so long. But here he was, inside the Goldenrod City Pokémon Center with absolute freedom. It was something that Zekrom hadn't felt in a long time.

He continued to pace, eventually walking back to where Raikou was sleeping. His cyber armor was still attached, but he was completely knocked out. Closing his eyes for a moment, he remembered what he had said to Typhlosion upon first meeting the cyborgified Raikou. He had made the promise to restore Raikou back to normal as soon as he could.

"And now is the time to act upon it." Zekrom nodded with determination, walking out of the room. While Zekrom didn't have his high-tech equipment with him that was still stuck at Team Rocket's HQ, he was in a modern Pokémon Center. All he would need is to borrow a few tools and some lubricant to loosen the armor. He walked over to where one of the Nurse Joys were, taking the nightly self.

"Can I help you, sir?" she asked, not thrown off by his appearance.

"Uhh… yes. Do you have a few medical tools and some lubricant that I can borrow?"

The Nurse Joy eyed Zekrom suspiciously. "…What would you need with those things? Our medical tools are only meant to be for the staff."

Zekrom sighed. "Look. I need to perform an operation to get… something off of a friend." he stated, not wanting to specify the cyber armor. "I only now have the ability to do it, since we finally arrived at a Pokémon Center."

"I'm not about to let a Pokémon perform some sort of operation without the help of a medical professional." she stated firmly.

Zekrom sighed. He did indeed have the knowledge necessary to get the cyber armor off, but he was going to need Nurse Joy's permission to do it.

"OK. How about a compromise? I do have the medical knowledge necessary to take off an item attached to someone. However, if you will let me borrow some medical tools and lubricant, you can accompany me and oversee the whole operation. Please?"

Nurse Joy thought about this for a moment. The Pokémon did seem pretty desperate, and it was a nurse's job to take care of those in need.

"OK." she nodded. "Under one more condition. In the event of any sort of operation to remove something from a body, the patient needs to be unconscious. Not just sleeping. Complete unconsciousness. Only if you will allow me to administer a small dose of anesthesia to the patient will I let you do this."

Zekrom realized that the nurse was right. If Raikou woke up in the middle of it, there's no telling how he would react. If he woke up in the middle, he could possibly wake up in extreme pain. Of course, he was going to gently wake Raikou up to get permission first. Performing an operation using anesthesia without explicit permission from the patient is… well, very illegal to say the least.

"Deal." Zekrom nodded.

Nurse Joy got up from where she was and walking in front of Zekrom. Heading over to a door, she grabbed a set of keys from her pocket to open it.

"Now, what precisely do you need?" she asked.

Zekrom thought for a moment. "Hmm. Well, the lubricant for one thing. A power drill with the ability to remove screws, towels, water, hydrogen peroxide, operating scissors, and bandages are what I will need. Can we also bring my friend into the operating room to do this?"

Nurse Joy was caught a bit off guard by the request for a power drill. Even though Nurse Joy was no surgeon, she couldn't ever remember a time when the surgeons ever had to use a power drill as part of a surgery.

"A… power drill?"

"Just… trust me on this, OK?"

"…All right, then." she nodded. Getting all of the supplies Zekrom listed, as well as some anesthesia, she came back out of the medical supply room and locked the door behind her.

"I'll go set this stuff in the operating room. You go get your friend, but make sure he knows what you're doing."

"Of course, ma'am." Zekrom said. With that, the two split apart as Zekrom headed back to where Raikou and everyone else were sleeping.

"Hey. Raikou." Zekrom whispered into the Beast's ear. Raikou's eyes slowly flickered to life, as his head looked up at Zekrom.

"…yEs?"

"It's… it's time. I can finally perform your surgery and get this stuff off of you. You'll be able to be back to normal again."

Raikou was silent at this. Things could really go back to normal again? This junk could finally come off? He was a bit choked up, with his genuine tears of happiness now sounding nothing like synthetic ones.

"…R-rEaLLy?"

"Yes." Zekrom smiled. "But I must ask for your consent for the surgery and to be put under anesthesia. You will likely wake up late tomorrow morning."

"YoU hAvE aLL oF mY pERmiSSiOn, zEKrOM."

Raikou was about to get up, but Zekrom did him one better. Being of great physical strength, Zekrom was easily able to lift the giant Electric-type Beast, and carry him out of the room.

"i cAn'T tHaNk YoU eNOuGh, ZeKRom…" he muttered softly.

* * *

><p>Zekrom brought Raikou to the operating room, and set him down on the table, with Raikou drifting back into dreamland. Nurse Joy gasped a little bit in surprise after seeing the Beast. After the whole fiasco with Ethan's fangirls, Nurse Joy really hadn't noticed Raikou during the whole thing. Now that she could see him clearly, she understood why Zekrom wanted to do this.<p>

"He is sleeping." Zekrom stated. "But as you said, we still need to use the anesthesia. Can you handle that?"

Nurse Joy, getting over her initial shock, nodded. After rubbing one of Raikou's legs with alcohol, she inserted the syringe into him. When she was done, she quickly removed the needle and disposed of it. At this point, Raikou was now completely unconscious.

"I… guess we start surgery now." Nurse Joy said, still perplexed at how this could happen to anybody, let alone a Legendary Beast.

"Yes." Zekrom acknowledged, grabbing the power drill. He turned the machine to its' slowest reverse setting, to minimize the chance of injury. With that, he slowly began his work.

* * *

><p>Around 2 hours or so passed until Zekrom had successfully managed to get all of the cyber armor off without injuring Raikou. The lubricant had helped in loosening the armor and in slowly pulling it out. The synthetic rubber suit that the cult had put on to prevent Raikou for discharging the armor was still there. Grabbing the operating scissors, Zekrom cut through the tough rubber like a knife through butter, with the suit quickly coming off. The only thing left to do now was to treat where the screws had been inserted into Raikou with hydrogen peroxide and clean up the excess blood. After doing so, he bandaged the areas. Zekrom looked at the clock after everything was said and done. It read 6 o'clock.<p>

"OK… that's everything." Zekrom yawned. "Nurse Joy, could you dispose of that armor for me? I'm going to take Raikou back into his room." Nurse Joy only nodded as Zekrom left, carrying Raikou.

Zekrom walked down the hallway, still yawning and somewhat tired from staying up since 2 in the morning. He brought Raikou back to where he had been sleeping earlier, setting him back down on the floor next to the sleeping Entei and Suicune. The three Legendary Beasts had been so tired after last night that all three of them collapsed on the floor. Zekrom chuckled, looking over the three of them.

"At least things are back to normal for them. They really deserve it after everything they went through." Zekrom said to himself. "But we still have some cult crazies to deal with…"

His soft talking had stirred Entei awake, yawning loudly as he got up. He didn't even glance at Raikou yet, only seeing Zekrom as he rose up. "Morning, Zekrom. Boy, last night was something else, wasn't it?" he chuckled.

Zekrom smiled. "Have you taken a look at Raikou yet?"

Entei raised his brow in confusion. "No." he said, turning to look at Raikou. "Why do you-"

The Fire-type Legendary Beast stopped mid-sentence. His attention was immediately drawn to Raikou. Not because of something he had, but because of something that he didn't.

His cyber armor was gone. All of it. Every last piece had been removed. The only sign of anything ever happening was the bandages around Raikou, slightly damp with some blood. Entei couldn't believe what he was seeing.

"How? When? Why…?"

"I woke up at 2 this morning." Zekrom stated. "I simply couldn't go back to sleep. And I promised to restore Raikou back to normal as soon as I could. I asked him if I could give him anesthesia and perform the surgery, and he gave his explicit permission."

Zekrom yawned again, still wiped out from said surgery. He chuckled. "It took around 3 hours or so, but… it was worth it. It really was. Especially to see that smile on your face."

Entei widened his eyes in surprise for a bit. True to what Zekrom said, he felt his hairy muzzle and found his mouth turned into the shape of a smile. And he couldn't bring himself to remove it whatsoever.

"I… um…" Entei found himself stuttering, something the usual composed Fire Beast never did. "I-I don't know what to say Zekrom, except… thank you."

"That's all I need to hear. Just let Raikou sleep for a little longer. The anesthesia should wear off in an hour or so."

"All right." Entei said. "Uh… it looks like everyone else is still asleep. Why don't we watch the TV in the front of the Pokémon Center to kill some time?"

* * *

><p>Entei and Zekrom shared a few laughs as they turned off the TV, with the Pokémon Center starting to open for the day. The two left back towards their room to check on the group after an hour or so passed. As Entei entered where the Legendary Beasts were sleeping, he noticed Raikou muttering to himself in his sleep.<p>

"Looks like the anesthesia wore off." Zekrom said. "Why don't you check on him; I'll get the humans up."

Entei nodded as he walked over to Raikou, using his paw to gently nudge Raikou out of his slumber.

"Entei…" he muttered groggily, his voice no longer synthesized. "Let me go back to sleep…"

Just as Raikou was about to resume his slumber, he realized something. His voice. It was… normal. His body felt a bit lighter too, like nothing was enclosed onto it anymore. His eyes widened as these realizations, and he dashed in front of the room's mirror to make sure he wasn't imagining things.

As he looked into his reflection, he saw that he really wasn't imagining things. He wasn't just dreaming now. His cybernetic chains… they had been cut off from him. Lifting a paw, he touched the mirror to get a good look at his face. It was normal now. His red eyes sparked with energy again rather than being a dull glow. He could even see his whiskers and front teeth again, no longer hidden away. Looking at his sides, there was no longer any more cyber armor screwed into his fur. He was bandaged up, and the screws had been taken out.

Unable to control his emotions, he sniffled a bit and cried tears of joy, now free from the mind control and enslavement. He turned back to face Entei, still crying. "E-Entei. I… I'm free. I'm normal again."

Entei smiled, hugging his brother. Raikou fully embraced his brother's hug, crying softly into his shoulders.

"Finally." Raikou whispered. "Entei, I want to apologize. It's my fault for running away in the first place and getting us into this mess. I shouldn't have been so rash. I…" Entei interrupted by putting a paw onto Raikou's mouth.

"You don't have to apologize. It's both of our faults for getting into such a pitiful argument in the first place. But we learn by experience. And even our rash decisions can have good effects. Had you not run away, we might have never met Ethan again. We helped a Typhlosion, an Infernape, and a Zekrom escape from Team Rocket. And we both learned a lot from this. But now we're all back together again. Our family is together again. You and me and Suicune."

"Wait." Raikou said. "Where is Suicune?"

"She's still asleep. She'll wake up soon enou-"

"Entei?" Suicune's voice muttered, stirring from sleep. "What's going-" She was stopped in her sentence when she laid eyes on Raikou. Raikou grinned as Suicune did what Raikou expected her to do. She pounced onto Raikou, and the two playfully tumbled around until Suicune pinned Raikou to the ground. Now, Suicune could finally have a clear look into Raikou's powerful red eyes.

"Raikou…" she smiled, releasing him from the ground and hugging him. "You're… you're you again."

"And we're all back together now." Raikou replied, being released from the hug. "And that's what counts."

Entei approached the two, who had tumbled all the way to the other side of the room. "All right, so what's our plan of action now? We're all together again, and Raikou is back to normal. Should we head home?"

Suicune smiled, thinking about Ethan. "I think we're already here."

Entei thought about what she said for a moment, confused briefly but then nodded. "You propose that we stay with Ethan?"

"Yeah. I… really miss our times with him. He's one of the best humans I've ever had the honor of knowing. He's a great battler as well. I would… I would like to return to him."

Entei smiled. "I couldn't agree more, Suicune. Besides, he's already officially caught 2 out of 3 of us. All that leaves is Raikou." he said, looking at him.

It didn't take long for Raikou to agree. "I'm with you guys. We're all in this together now, and I would love to be with Ethan again."

"Then let's go tell him." Suicune said, leading the trio to where Ethan was sleeping. As the trio entered the room, they noticed that Zekrom had already woken the boy up and had just finished getting dressed. Ethan glanced at Raikou, but didn't react in surprise. "Hey Raikou. Zekrom told me about the whole surgery thing with your cyborg stuff. I'm glad you're back to normal. I'll bet you're quite happy about it."

"I'm happier than you could ever imagine, Ethan."

"That's good." he chuckled.

"But I want to ask a favor of you."

"What would that be?"

"Entei and Suicune have already consented to be under your ownership again. And I would like to be, as well."

Ethan smiled, grabbing a spare Pokéball out from his pack. "So, the gang's getting back together, huh?"

"I look forward to more great times together."

With great force, Ethan threw the ball at Raikou. As the spherical device tapped him, the red light sucked him up into the ball, and closed shut. As it traditionally did, the Pokéball shook one, then two, then three times, before finally clicking shut.

"Looks like all of us are a family again." Ethan smiled, now releasing Raikou from his Pokéball. Raikou appeared in front of Ethan, happy to be back with him.

"Thanks, Ethan."

"No problem at all, Raikou. Now, there's only one thing left for us to do before we can put this all to rest."

Raikou smirked, knowing what that meant. "All that's left is kicking the asses of those crazy cult guys to free Reshiram and the rest of Team Rocket's Pokémon!"

* * *

><p>"Hey… Typhlosion."<p>

Typhlosion's ears perked up, as he woke up beside Victor since he took the empty bed next to him. The stub that was Victor's left arm had eased up tremendously in pain as he tried moving it. "Yeah, Victor?"

"I… uh… I think I remember a few more things."

This immediately caught Typhlosion's attention. "Really? Like what?"

"…My arm… it got blown off, right?"

"…Yes. Yes, it did. We were on a train and you were trying to defuse the bomb. However, it… it blew up and…"

"I used my arm to cover it, right?"

Typhlosion nodded. "Your memory is really starting to come back."

"Yeah." Victor said. "It feels a lot clearer than it did yesterday. Though a few things are still kind of fuzzy. But if it makes you feel any better… I still remember that we are very close friends. I haven't forgotten that."

"It does make me feel better, Victor. It really does."

At that point, Alakazam teleported into their room, catching them both by surprise.

"Try to give us a little bit of a heads-up, would you?" Typhlosion asked.

Alakazam shrugged his shoulders. "All right. Anyway, Ethan found me and told me to tell you guys that Raikou's back to normal."

"Back to normal?"

"As in, 'not a cyborg anymore' back to normal."

Typhlosion paused for a moment, but then smiled softly, knowing what that meant.

"Thanks for letting me know."

"No problem." Alakazam said again, teleporting out.

"…Can't that guy just use the door? His room isn't that far from ours." Victor laughed. Typhlosion couldn't help but laugh as well.

It felt good to be free.

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

Whoo! Finally got this chapter done. Sorry for the severe lack of action here. I really wanted to go into detail about Raikou finally being freed from his own chains. I promise you guys, the next chapter is when the final showdown will start to take place! As always, read and review.

Also, there is a Slaves and Soldiers poll on my profile now if you want to take that.


	27. Giovanni's Final Fight! (Part 1)

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 27: Giovanni's Final Fight! (Part 1)

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><p>"So, is everyone ready?"<p>

Ethan looked over the group of Pokémon in his Pokémon Center room. Over this adventure, Ethan had met quite the group of characters, with all of them now sharing one common purpose.

Alakazam.

Raikou.

Entei.

Suicune.

Zekrom.

Typhlosion.

Buddy.

All of the battle-ready Pokémon were here, ready for the final showdown. With a team of seven powerful Pokémon by his side, and with the former Rocket Pokémon now freed from their slavery, it was time to end this. Ethan's team now had the necessary power to stop this cult in their tracks, destroy the equipment to never let it happen again, and most importantly for Zekrom, finally free Reshiram.

But it wouldn't stop there. After the cult was taken care of, Team Rocket was next on the list. He had the aim of disbanding Team Rocket for good, making sure they never came back. The extra distance was going to be taken, freeing any Pokémon there working against their will, and taking down every last leader and executive. Ethan wasn't going to risk any possibility of the villainous team recovering. It was finally time to show them the power of the Johto Region's Champion!

Buddy smiled, gripping Ethan's shoulder. "We're all ready… partner."

"All right, here's the plan." Ethan began. "We're going to head to the Ruins of Alph first, with stopping this cult being our biggest priority at the moment. Once we hit the Ruins of Alph, we'll split up into two teams. Team 1 will be me, Zekrom, Typhlosion, and Buddy. Team 2 will be Lyra, Alakazam, Raikou, Entei, and Suicune. Team 2 will head in first through the front, and Alakazam, it's your job to use Hypnosis to knock out as many of the other cult members as possible."

"Understood, Ethan." Alakazam nodded.

"And Raikou, since you know the area of the Ruins best, you'll lead Team 2's Alakazam into taking out as many members as possible. Try to stay as stealthy as possible."

"Yes, Ethan." Raikou responded.

"Entei and Suicune will go in for extra battle back-up if you are seen and confrontation is necessary. If you guys do get seen, try to attract as many members as you can. Best way to do that is to be as violent and destructive as possible once you're discovered. But the more members you can just knock out with Hypnosis, the easier it'll be for you to distract all of them."

"Gotcha." Entei answered.

"Lyra, you need to go with Team 2 to serve as a way of communication with Team 1. Once Team 2 has either knocked out all of the members successfully, or has managed to distract all of them in a furious battle, you need to find a way to step out of the battle, and call me on the Pokégear."

"R-Right." Lyra said.

"When Lyra gives us the signal, Team 1 will enter through the back and towards where the machinery, computer system, and Reshiram are kept. And Typhlosion, since you've also been there before, you'll lead us to the machinery we need to destroy."

"Yes, of course." Typhlosion responded.

"Once Team 1 has destroyed the machinery and computer system, we'll also find and free Reshiram. When we find her, we may possibly need to battle her to calm her down. In the case that happens, we need to be prepared to battle. When she is able to leave, Zekrom can escort her out and head back to this Pokémon Center in Goldenrod City to get Bill's help again in removing the machinery from her."

"Y-Yes." Zekrom nodded.

"After Team 1 has completed all of this, Team 1 will join Team 2 in taking down any remaining members. And once the whole mess is over, we'll call the Johto Police Department to clean up whatever's left and arrest them. Does everyone understand?"

"GOT IT!" everyone answered.

"And that's Part 1. We'll go over Part 2 after we finish up Part 1."

"Understood." Alakazam answered for everyone else.

After the plan was discussed, the entire group headed out of the room and towards the front of the Pokémon Center. Typhlosion had already told Victor that he'd be gone for a while, so he wouldn't worry. The group had exited the Pokémon Center, only to find a very familiar, yet unfriendly, face.

It was one Ethan was familiar with, but had not seen for a long time. The last time had been 8 years ago, and Ethan never expected him to appear now. And now of all times.

"Giovanni…"

* * *

><p>Giovanni couldn't help but smile as he saw Ethan. Not a malicious smile, but a genuine one. Nevertheless, many of the other people and Pokémon already in the Pokémon Center ran out, terrified.<p>

"Ethan… it's been a while, hasn't it?" Giovanni smiled.

Ethan wasn't amused in the slightest. "How did you even get here? How did you know where we were?"

Giovanni laughed. "Boy, you should already know the answer to that question. You might have taken off their anklets, but the tracking devices inside them were never de-activated. I only waited until morning to come here just to be a good sport."

Buddy growled, clenching his fist. "What do you want with Master? You'll regret it if you touch a hair on his head!" he threatened, ready to attack if needed.

"Relax, you ridiculous alligator." Giovanni said. "I'm not here to hurt anyone. I'm here to take my employees-"

Typhlosion also growled. "Like I'd ever go back to Team Rocket!"

Giovanni's eyes narrowed. "Let me finish, you foolish Pokémon. I'm going to take my employees back… if you decline or lose at the duel I shall offer you."

Ethan let down his stance, motioning Buddy to stay back. "…A duel?"

"Exactly." Giovanni answered. "A duel. If you win, I leave and you keep your Pokémon. My 'employees' will be considered officially 'retired'. And to sweeten the deal, I'll even retire from Team Rocket. After all, you've already proven that they can't even hold themselves together without their boss."

"…What's the catch?" Ethan asked, knowing that this deal didn't come without some sort of price.

Giovanni smiled again. "You're a sharp boy, Ethan. That certainly hasn't changed. Of course, it wouldn't be fair if I won and got no prize."

"…I think I know what kind of prize he has in mind." Ethan scowled.

"If you win, I forfeit my employee Pokémon to you and I retire from Team Rocket. No strings attached." Giovanni said. "However, if I come out of this battle victorious… then you surrender. You will forfeit every Pokémon you own to me with absolutely no hassle and no fighting. And you will never see them again. And my employees… well, my employee Pokémon will have to come out of retirement." Giovanni smirked, glancing at his 'workers'.

Ethan was taken aback by this, visibly shocked. If he accepted this duel, he would be putting the lives of his Pokémon on the line. Typhlosion… the Legendary Beasts… and Buddy. Buddy… his best friend since he started his journey. All of them would be gone… forever. Never to be seen again. And without any Pokémon, he would lose his title as 'Johto Champion'.

Ethan looked back at Buddy. "Buddy…"

Buddy looked back at Ethan, giving a serious nod. "Go for it. We won't lose."

Ethan looked back at all of the other Pokémon. The Legendary Beasts… Zekrom… Alakazam… all of them had been through so much, and their time for freedom was almost here. Only two more things stood in their way. And Giovanni had to be taken down first.

Ethan faced Giovanni again. "Giovanni… I accept your challenge."

Giovanni smirked. "I always liked that about you. You never know when to quit. Anyway, I suppose we should take this battle behind the Pokémon Center. It would be inconsiderate to wreck the building, wouldn't it?" he said, leaving and walking towards the back, with Ethan and the group following.

Even though Giovanni was evil, one thing was always sure. He was always a gentleman. And he NEVER broke his word. Even Ethan knew that he wouldn't back down on the deal that was offered.

But then, why offer it in the first place? Giovanni must've been very confident in victory.

The two humans, along with Ethan's Pokémon, got outside to the battlegrounds. Giovanni's Pokémon were in their Pokéballs, ready to battle when needed.

"I suppose I shall explain the rules for this match." Giovanni said. "This match will be a full six-on-six match. Each of us will have a team of six Pokémon, and decisions are final. When a Pokémon faints, another one must be sent out within 30 seconds. The match ends when one person's Pokémon have all fainted. The person with their team left standing is the winner. Decide on your team, and then we will begin." Giovanni concluded, leaving to privately choose his Pokémon.

Ethan gathered the team together. "All right. Who do we have that can compete? Victor is in absolutely no condition to battle, so we have… Typhlosion, Zekrom, Buddy, all three Legendary Beasts, and Alakazam. That means one of you will have to sit out."

"Well, wasn't Giovanni a Master of Ground-types? In Viridian City, he used to be the Ground-type Gym Leader there." Lyra pointed out.

"This is true. However, he's not anymore. I have a feeling that he probably expanded beyond Ground-types for better team coverage since he left. But it will still be primarily Ground-types, if I had to make a guess." Ethan discussed.

Raikou thought this over. "Maybe I should sit this out. Zekrom has additional Dragon-type coverage that I don't, and I'm still recovering from the surgery."

Suicune looked over at her Electric-type brother. "Are you sure that you're OK with that, Raikou?"

Raikou smiled and nodded. "Whatever it takes to beat him, Suicune."

Ethan nodded in argument. "All right. So our team is Zekrom, Typhlosion, Buddy, Entei, Suicune, and Alakazam. He's most likely to lead out with a Ground-type, so Suicune will be sent out first."

Suicune nodded in agreement. "Yes, Ethan. I must admit, it will be nice to fight alongside you after so long."

Lyra looked over to Giovanni, coming back to the battleground. "Hey, Ethan? I think Giovanni has his team ready."

"Good. So do I." Ethan left to face Giovanni at the battleground. Unlike Giovanni, Ethan had none of his Pokémon recalled into Pokéballs.

The two humans then faced each other from the opposite sides of the battleground. Giovanni with a smirk on his face, and Ethan with sheer determination in his eyes. Giovanni started to speak.

"I will count down from three. When I said 'go', we will both send our lead Pokémon out simultaneously."

"Three…" Giovanni gripped his Pokéball.

"Two…" Ethan clenched his fist, planning to win at all costs.

"One…" Their eyes met and were locked in war.

"GO!"

"Suicune!"

"Excadrill!"

The two Pokémon emerged on the battlefield. Suicune ran onto it, and Giovanni sent out an Excadrill from his Pokéball. Ethan was familiar with Excadrill, as he had visited Unova before. The Unova Gym Leader Clay used one, and it was an extremely difficult match. Despite their short stature, an Excadrill was NEVER to be underestimated in battle.

"Excadrill! Drill Run!" Giovanni ordered.

"Exca… drill!" it shouted, running across the battlefield at a lightning speed, aiming straight for Suicune.

"Suicune! Use Scald!" Ethan ordered. Suicune immediately obeyed, spraying a gush of boiling hot water towards the advancing Excadrill. The attack caused Excadrill to recoil back, suffering some damage. The attack charred his skin and left a burn.

_"Yes. Now Excadrill's attack will be lowered."_ Ethan noted.

Giovanni only flashed an unassuring smile, giving Excadrill his next order.

"Excadrill! Sandstorm!"

Ethan's jaw went agape as the Excadrill obeyed his master's orders. A sandstorm had been summoned onto the battlefield, making it harder for Suicune to see as well as taking slow and gradual damage from it.

"Suicune! Hang in there! Use Whirlpool to disperse the Sandstorm!" Ethan commanded.

Closing her eyes, Suicune focused, running to the center of the battlefield and spun around. Water jets ejected from her mouth, clearing up the Sandstorm and leaving the battlefield moist and damp. Giovanni scowled.

"Now, Suicune! Hydro Pump!"

Suicune ran up to the Excadrill, charging up a powerful burst of water in her mouth.

"Excadrill!" Giovanni shouted. "Get out of the-"

But it was too late for the Excadrill to dodge. Suicune was already on him, bursting out a powerful and merciless stream of water onto the opponent. Several seconds passed as the stream of water continued and then finally ended. When it cleared up, Excadrill was left on the ground, knocked unconscious. Giovanni sighed, recalling his Pokémon. "Well, good job anyways, Excadrill." he muttered.

"Now, that's one down, and five to go!" Ethan cheered.

Giovanni smirked. "Don't get your hopes up too high, boy. I'm just getting started!" Grabbing another Pokéball, he summoned his next Pokémon.

"Come on out! Hydreigon!"

A huge, hulking dark-colored beast came out of the Pokéball, floating menacingly in the air. It growled, snarled, and drooled heavily at Suicune, even intimidating the Water-type Beast a little bit. Still, she composed herself and faced her opponent.

"Hydreigon! Use Dragon Pulse!"

Before Suicune could even register Giovanni's command, the Hydreigon obeyed, swiftly charging up the move and unleashing its' full power on Suicune.

"Ahh! No!" she screamed, getting thrown back a fair distance.

"Suicune!" Ethan yelled.

Suicune was lying on the ground, laboring for every breath. As she groaned, she found the energy to stand back up, although weakly.

_"Suicune's not going to hold up for much longer."_ Ethan realized. _"I'll get one last priority attack in."_

"Suicune! Use Aqua Jet!" Ethan ordered.

Suicune weakly nodded, using the last bit of her energy to strike Hydreigon with a slightly weaker attack before it could react. It damaged the Hydreigon slightly, but not by much.

"Hydreigon! Finish her off with Dark Pulse!"

Hydreigon immediately obeyed, launching an orb of darkness towards Suicune. Having no energy or chance to dodge it, Suicune took the full brunt of the hit. Almost immediately after contact, Suicune swirled around a little bit and then collapsed onto the ground, unconscious.

Ethan immediately recalled Suicune. "Great job, Suicune. You did the best you could." Ethan glared at the Hydreigon, trying to figure out the best strategy for it.

_"Come on, Ethan. Think! You've faced one of these before; Champion Iris used one! Hydreigon is a Dark/Dragon type, so who would be best?"_

After a few seconds, Ethan made his decision.

"Zekrom! Get out on the battlefield!"

Zekrom nodded, immediately leaping into action. Giovanni was one of the two obstacles standing in his way to free Reshiram, and he was going to do his damndest in battle.

With Zekrom being part Dragon-type, Ethan knew that this was a high risk-high reward strategy. Dragon was super effective against itself, so it all depended on who could stand longest in battle.

"Zekrom! Use Outrage!"

"Hydreigon! Use Dragon Pulse!"

Immediately, Zekrom entered a berserk frenzy, mercilessly attacking and clawing at Hydreigon. Hydreigon did fire off a Dragon Pulse, though it only did about 1/3 damage to Zekrom.

Zekrom's berserk frenzy continued, and kept at it like a mad man, attacking and clawing until the Hydreigon lay unconscious, giving Hydreigon no chance to counter attack. The frenzy was enough to keep Zekrom clawing at Hydreigon long after it was unconscious, with the Hydreigon bleeding heavily. To prevent further damage to his Hydreigon, Giovanni recalled it.

After his Outrage attack wore off, Zekrom was left extremely dazed and confused. Ethan, aware of the risks of Zekrom being confused, sent him back out of battle. With him confused, Zekrom highly risked injuring himself, and Ethan didn't want to take that risk yet. Zekrom sort of stumbled awkwardly towards Ethan, eventually just sitting down to recover from the confusion.

Ethan turned to Lyra. "Lyra, can you go out to the nearby routes and find either a Lum Berry or Persim Berry? Those berries can heal confusion."

Giovanni shook his head. "Oh, Ethan. I simply can't let you do that. You simply can't leave the battlefield to get something to cure a status condition. That includes your little friend over there."

Ethan clenched his fist. "All right, I'll play your little game, Giovanni. But the same rules apply to you!"

Giovanni laughed. "Of course. I'm always a man of my word. Now, I've already made my next Pokémon choice. Have you?"

"Indeed I have."

"Go, Entei!"

"Come out, Steelix!"

The two Pokémon emerged on the battlefield, with Steelix towering high over Entei.

_"This is going to be risky." _Ethan thought to himself. _"Steelix is a Steel/Ground type, meaning that Entei's Fire-type is super effective against it… but so is Steelix's Ground-type against Entei."_

Ethan's focus returned to battle. _"Steelix is mostly Defense-oriented, so…"_

"Entei! Use Fire Blast!"

Entei immediately obeyed, dashing up to Steelix and launching a Fire Blast from his mouth, scorching Steelix. Perhaps not too surprisingly, Steelix tanked the hit, but took a heavy amount of damage.

"Steelix. Use Gyro Ball." Giovanni ordered.

Steelix slowly spun around, using the move. Gyro Ball was a move that grew more powerful the slower the user was. Entei tried to leap out of the way, but Steelix's massive size ensured contact with Entei, severely damaging him.

"Argh!" he grunted, falling to the ground.

"Entei!"

"Don't worry about me! I'm fine!" he replied almost immediately, getting back up again. Gyro Ball had taken down a good chunk of his health, but he could still fight.

"Entei! Use Fire Blast again!" Ethan commanded. Entei performed the same command, dashing around the slow Steelix and ejecting another Fire Blast from his mouth, causing the colossal snake to faint. Entei had to run to get out of the way of where Steelix fell, barely avoiding getting squashed.

Entei sighed in relief as Steelix fainted. Things were looking good for them, so Ethan's team might just pull off a victory.

Ethan smirked. "That's one Pokémon of mine down, and three of yours down. I wouldn't be too confident in winning this yet."

Giovanni only smiled. "Boy, I'm just warming up. You haven't even seen my trump cards yet. And here's the first one! Greninja, come out!"

As the aquatic frog ninja Pokémon came out of his Pokéball, Ethan looked on in confusion.

_"That's odd." _he thought. _"I don't think I've seen this Pokémon before."_

Ethan pulled out his trusty Pokédex to scan this bizarre new Pokémon. "Greninja, the Ninja Pokémon. It appears and vanishes with a ninja's grace. It toys with its enemies using swift movements, while slicing them with throwing stars of sharpest water."

_"Interesting. A Ninja Pokémon. But… what's its typing? It certainly looks Water-type."_

Ethan had already decided his next move. "Entei! Fall-"

"I don't think so! Greninja, Water Shuriken!"

The Greninja immediately obeyed, leaping forward before Entei could even fall back. It charged up a Shuriken made of water in its' hands, launching them at high speed towards Entei. Due to their quickness, 5 of them made contact with Entei before he could register what happened. Entei ended up falling over and losing consciousness.

Ethan's jaw went agape. That Greninja Pokémon was ridiculously fast. He looked at Zekrom. He seemed to have recovered from his Outrage confusion. Plus, Zekrom was Electric-type. He should be able to bring down Greninja easily, despite the Speed disadvantage.

"Zekrom! Get back on the battlefield!"

Zekrom heard Ethan's commands and ran back out to the battlefield. While Zekrom's health was still lowered from the Hydreigon battle, he was still ready to fight.

"Zekrom! Bolt Strike!"

"Greninja! Ice Beam!"

Zekrom began to charge up his powerful Bolt Strike move, one that would guarantee for Greninja to faint. Even though Greninja was faster, Ethan knew that Zekrom had the bulk to withstand an Ice Beam from a non-Ice type.

…Or did he?

Greninja fired off his Ice Beam, striking Zekrom. While Ethan had counted on Zekrom tanking the hit, he instead suffered extremely harsh damage that brought him down to critical health! Zekrom was left panting, barely hanging on to consciousness.

"What?!" Ethan yelled in shock. "How's that possible?! Greninja couldn't have knocked Zekrom into critical health if he wasn't an Ice-type!"

Giovanni smirked. "It seems that you are starting to understand. While Greninjas are indeed a speedy species, they have very low defenses. However, this Greninja has a special ability designed to make any type of move it performs significantly more powerful."

"An ability?" Ethan muttered. He was familiar with abilities, but what kind of ability allowed for a Pokémon to do this?

"Protean is an ability that the Greninja species line can have." Giovanni coldly educated Ethan on the subject. "Whenever they use a move, their typing changes to the move they used. This means that any move they use will become more powerful because the type of the Pokémon changes as well."

"WHAT?!"

Giovanni only laughed, not reassuring in the slightest. "I suggest you figure out a strategy to defeat my Greninja quickly, or else all of your Pokémon become mine."

Ethan's mind became clouded with fear and confusion. _"Oh damn it. What do I do…?"_

To be continued…

* * *

><p>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak

FINALLY, an update after half of a year. Again, I apologize. Things in my home life have been ridiculous lately. From family issues, to medical issues, to writer's block, to playing way too much of Xenoblade Chronicles, I had a hard time devoting myself back to writing. Thankfully, this chapter is finally up, and I highly encourage you to read and review as always.


	28. Giovanni's Final Fight! (Part 2)

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 28: Giovanni's Final Fight! (Part 2)

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><p>Giovanni and Ethan still stood on the battlefield, Ethan trying to quickly plan his next move. Suicune and Entei were unconscious, and Zekrom was still under the effects of confusion.<p>

_"Think, Ethan! Think! Greninja is a glass cannon. He can change his type, is extremely fast, and has frail defenses. Electric-type moves won't work if he's already changed to an Ice-type. And even if Entei was conscious, Greninja would go first anyway. And Raikou's sitting out. Hmm…"_

Giovanni tapped his foot, waiting on Ethan. "Take your time, Ethan. I'm a very patient man. You'll inevitably lose in the end."

Ethan sighed. "Looks like I've got no choice. Time for a leap of faith… Buddy, get out here!"

Buddy nodded, obeying the command of his trainer. "What's your plan?"

Ethan started to whisper. "Greninja is a Water/Dark type. Frail defenses, solid attack power, and super fast. But you are pure Water. The worst he could pack is Grass Knot, which you should be able to tank, with your own solid defenses and medium weight. Trust me on this."

Buddy smiled softly. "With my life." He then turned to face Giovanni's Greninja.

"Grass Knot!" Giovanni ordered his Greninja. As expected, Greninja's fast speed allowed him to go first. He leapt towards Buddy, twisting the grass at his feet to cause him to trip and take damage. Giovanni smirked for a moment… which instantly vanished when he saw that the Feraligatr had tanked the hit. Even with Greninja's good special attack and Protean, Buddy himself tanked the hit and still felt strong.

"Is that all?" Buddy smirked. "I expected a harder hit, or did you forget that Feraligatrs are not quite as heavy as you thought?

"Ice Fang!" Ethan ordered. Greninja's Protean ability had been his own undoing. Using Grass Knot turned Greninja himself into a Grass-type… and thus, extremely weak to Ice. With Buddy's own solid attack, Greninja's frailty and current weakness to Ice, the move was super effective. Greninja spun around dizzily for a bit, before finally fainting.

Giovanni sighed, recalling his Greninja. "Well, I must commend you Ethan. You've already exploited the mechanics of how Protean works and used it to your own advantage. But you realize that you still have two more Pokémon that you need to take care of, correct?"

Ethan nodded. "I'll keep my current one out. I still have Alakazam, Typhlosion, and Buddy himself. We can do this."

"Very well. Come on out! Kangaskhan!" he ordered, throwing another Pokéball out onto the field. A Kangaskhan emerged from the Pokéball, smiling at Giovanni and then petting her baby inside of her pouch.

Lyra chuckled, looking on. "I'm going to admit, that's kinda adorable. Even if he is our enemy."

Ethan chuckled as well. "Kangaskhan are quite an admirable species like that, taking care of their young like that."

His face suddenly turned serious. "But she's Giovanni's Pokémon, and this is a battle I can't afford to lose. I can't show mercy."

Giovanni smiled. "I'm glad you agree Ethan, because I can't show mercy either." he said, pulling out an odd bracelet from his pocket. It had some kind of special stone locked into a slot on the bracelet. It was small, holding a double helix inside of it and it started to glow a soft blue. The Kangaskhan herself also held up her own stone, which glowed yellow and purple.

For once, Ethan wasn't sure of what was going on. Normally a master tactician in battle, he honestly had no clue what these stones were. He never did make the trip to Kalos.

"Kangaskhan! Mega Evolve!" Giovanni shouted.

"What?!" Ethan yelled, startled by what this "Mega Evolution" was.

Giovanni held up the bracelet, and lights burst out of it. The same happened with Kangaskhan's stone, with bright light surrounding her. Ethan had to shield his eyes from the intense light. When the light died down, Kangaskhan herself didn't seem to change much… but her BABY did, now out of her mother's pouch and ready to fight.

"Whoa?! Wait! How is…?!" Ethan stuttered, never witnessing anything like this before.

"I suppose I'll need to explain it to you, don't I?" Giovanni smirked. "Kangaskhan here has just Mega Evolved into Mega Kangaskhan. It's a type of temporary evolution that greatly boosts the power of the Pokémon, changing their appearance. But in this case, the Kangaskhan has transferred her Mega Evolution power to her baby, who is now able to fight alongside her."

Lyra couldn't help but smile. "That's… actually really sweet."

Giovanni smirked. "And that's exactly why she's such a threat. With her baby out, she can now attack twice, with the second hit from her baby being at half power. It's so powerful, that her Mega Form has even been banned in official Pokémon Tournament. Not even those Legendary Beasts are on the ban list!"

Raikou paid attention to this despite standing on the sidelines, glaring at Giovanni with hatred.

Ethan gulped a bit. To be honest, he was a bit nervous. A lot was on the line here, but he couldn't afford to lose. He looked over to Buddy, who gave him a confident smile.

"Right." Ethan nodded. "We can do this. Buddy, use Thrash!"

"Not so fast! Kangaskhan, use Power-Up Punch!"

Before Buddy could even register the other command, Kangaskhan dealt a hefty punch at him, injuring him. He was about to retaliate, but then the baby came out and dealt ANOTHER punch, boosted up by the attack power gain of the first punch. He was close to collapsing, but held in. Going in towards the Mega Kangaskhan, he started to Thrash and beat up the enemy mercilessly. Ethan realized in horror that the attack only damaged the Kangaskhan down to only half of her HP… and Buddy was locked into Thrash.

"Oh no…" Ethan muttered softly.

"Kangaskhan, use Power-Up Punch once more!" Giovanni smirked.

Kangaskhan obeyed, with both herself and her child hitting Buddy with great force, and quadrupled their attack power. Buddy immediately fainted, collapsing on the ground.

Ethan had a few tears in his eyes. "Good job, Buddy." he said, recalling him to his Pokéball.

Ethan had to look over his options. Kangaskhan had QUADRUPLED her attack power. The only true option he had was to send out someone faster than Kangaskhan and KO it in one hit. Hopefully.

"Alakazam. You're up." Ethan said.

He slowly walked onto the battlefield. "I trust you, Ethan."

Ethan thought deeply about which move would be best for the situation. An idea came up, but it would require a bit of luck to pull off. Still, it was his only option.

"Alakazam, use Thunder Wave!" he ordered. Alakazam seemed a bit confused by this order at first, but still obeyed. He launched a small wave of electricity, paralyzing the Kangaskhan.

Giovanni's heart skipped a beat, but he gave out his order. "Kangaskhan! Use Crunch!"

Unfortunately for him, Kangaskhan couldn't move due to the paralysis. He grit his teeth.

Ethan's plan had worked… so far. Now to finish her off. Hopefully.

"Alakazam, use Focus Blast." he ordered.

Alakazam gulped, knowing the shaky accuracy of that move. Still, it was the only possible option. A ball of orange light rose shakily from Alakazam's head. Acting fast, he launched it towards the Kangaskhan.

…It was a direct hit, fainting the Kangaskhan. Giovanni cursed as his team ace had just collapsed. Still, he recalled the Kangaskhan as Ethan trembled with relief. A lot of luck was in that strategy, but it had worked. Now, it was two Pokémon against the last one of Giovanni's.

"Hmm. Congratulations, Ethan. Not many have managed to conquer my ace Pokémon. You were incredibly strategic… and incredibly lucky. However, I still have one Pokémon left…"

"Reshiram, I choose you!"

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

I have to apologize for the shorter chapter. I've been in a bit of a writing funk for the longest time, but this was the best I could manage while still leaving a hook. Now, Reshiram has been summoned… but by whom?


	29. Family

Slaves and Soldiers

Chapter 29: Family

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><p>"What?!"<p>

Ethan stood in both confusion and shock as he saw the mighty Reshiram standing before him. Even Giovanni had total confusion all over his face at Reshiram's sudden presence. But Reshiram didn't look like how she was supposed to.

Zekrom, still tired from the battle but still standing and recovered from his confusion, only saw his beloved in horror. "No… no. No! I knew Victor said this, but… no. Reshiram… How could they…?" he cried.

At this point, she was almost completely submitted into her cyborg side programming. One could barely even tell that the mighty Reshiram was underneath so many parts. Was her sliver of hope even left?

A robotic headpiece with only an opening for her nose and mouth.

Arm cannons replacing her regular arms and wings, as well as energy-seeking missiles still on said wings.

Her torso covered with a metallic looking armor along with her statistics and vitals shown.

Her tail massively increased in power via implants to reach the speed of Mach 1.

Her feet now turned into powerful jet boots that could produce flames.

In fact, the only natural parts left uncovered were her hair tails and neck. Other than that, everything else had some sort of metal part screwed into it.

"She… she has even more parts on her than I remember…" Typhlosion said in horror.

The sound of an evil laughter interrupted everyone. Everyone right there turned around to see the sound of it.

A bald man wearing a red cloak caught their attention. On the chest of his cloak was the same red mechanical eye with that aurora of evil that Victor had seen earlier.

"Xaphan… What are YOU doing here?!" Giovanni ordered him to tell.

"Isn't it clear by now?" he said in a uncomfortably friendly tone of voice. "Our mission is to robotize all living Pokémon. That includes everyone here. And we'll fix that Raikou up right this time." he scowled, glaring at Raikou.

"And what about me?" Typhlosion rebelled. "You know, your stupid little prophet that refuses to go along with any of this!"

"Nothing a simple little brainwashing can't fix." he laughed. "You're the prophet and you WILL fulfill your destiny by killing off the Infernape of Morality."

"You mean Victor?" Typhlosion grit his teeth. "If you even think that I would even so much as physically hit him, then you are sorely mistaken!"

"Again, that's what the brainwashing will be for. Anyway, I'm spending too much time yapping my mouth. Reshiram, use Blue Flare. On ALL of them!"

Reshiram tried to resist, but still obeyed the orders. She exhaled a blue flame from her mouth, severely burning everyone except for the Fire-type Typhlosion that was still standing… but this time, the attack also targeted the HUMANS as well. Ethan, Lyra, and Giovanni were all on the ground, grasping themselves in pain.

"You bastard… how dare you betray me! I sold Reshiram to you and this is how you pay me back?!" Giovanni yelled in anger, still writhing in pain.

"Wait…" Zekrom clenched his fists, despite the severe burns. "YOU SOLD HER OFF?!"

"Don't take it too personally, Giovanni." Xaphan assured him. "Sure, you sold her to me, but nothing was ever stated that I couldn't use her against you."

Giovanni grit his teeth. "Fine. You leave me no choice. It's time for me to finally send out my last Pokémon." he said, grabbing his Pokéball and tossed it, still on the ground. "Go, Garchomp!"

Giovanni's final Pokémon was sent out. Garchomp, along with Raikou, Typhlosion, Zekrom, and Alakazam, were the last forces standing against this evil cult. This was truly the final battle, and a battle that they couldn't afford to lose.

Currently, Raikou, Zekrom, and Alakazam were suffering from their extreme burns, which would cut their attack power and lower their energy every once in a while. While the burns didn't cripple Raikou and Alakazam as much due to them using Special Attacks, it completely crippled Zekrom as he relied on Physical Attacks.

Nonetheless, everyone left had to step in and battle to save the humans and the rest of the Pokémon from being cyborgified. And they had to be quick before either Reshiram or their burns take them. Right now, it was the good side's turn to attack.

Alakazam was the first to react. "Thunder Wave!" he shouted, using the move to paralyze Reshiram.

Raikou quickly went next. "Thunderbolt!" he yelled, using a strike of lightning to hit Reshiram. Slowly, Reshiram's health began to chip down.

"SolarBeam!" Typhlosion yelled, charging his attack to blast the Reshiram with a powerful SolarBeam if he could withstand the next one, as he wasn't suffering from a burn.

"Bulldoze!" Garchomp said, not wanting to use Earthquake to damage his temporary allies. He came down onto Reshiram with force, dealing moderate damage and bringing her health to under 50%. As a bonus effect, Reshiram's speed also went down.

Zekrom only stood there, unable to move in shock. He couldn't attack. He didn't want to attack. He couldn't even bring himself to attack his beloved. Instead, he started begging; trying to reach whatever humanity Reshiram had left.

"Reshiram! Listen to me! It's me, Zekrom! Your loved one! Please, listen to what I have to say!"

Xaphan only laughed. "You poor, naïve fool. She won't listen to anyone except her Master."

"Please! I… I'm sorry." Zekrom cried. "I'm so sorry that I couldn't protect you! The reason why you could never find me that day… our wedding day… I had to leave with Giovanni to protect you. Otherwise, he would've blown you up. That bomb… that bomb was implanted around your neck. Was it removed, Reshiram?"

Xaphan smirked. "Whatever you say doesn't matter anymore. Nothing at all. Now, Reshiram! Blue Flare!"

Reshiram was just about to attack and knock them all out with a Blue Flare… but she stopped for a moment. Curiously, she felt around her neck with what used to be her arm. That bomb wasn't there. Did that bomb never exist, or… was this Zekrom telling the truth?

"You have to understand!" Zekrom insisted. "I never knew what happened to you! For six years… for six years, I've been enslaved under Giovanni's hand! I never knew that he sold you off to this cult! He betrayed his promise to me! That you would be safe and unharmed if I cooperated! And… and I thought you were still in Unova all this time until a few days ago. Please… understand. Please forgive me. I never wanted this to happened." he continued, crying once more.

"Reshiram! Did you hear me?!" Xaphan yelled. "Use Blue Flare!"

Reshiram was still once more. This Zekrom's words… she could hear them. But what did they mean? Zekrom… she knew that name.

"…ZeKrOm?" Reshiram finally spoke.

"Yes! Reshiram! I know that you are in there somewhere! Your true spirit is still in your heart! But you need to fight! You have to escape from their clutches! Because… Because I love you. I want you back. Please…"

"Reshiram?! What are you doing?! Obey your Master! Ignore him! Attack them!" Xaphan screamed angrily.

"ObEy… FiGHt… ObEy… FiGHt…" Reshiram started talking, confused and trying to understand.

Zekrom continued to give words of encouragement. "Yes! You can do it! I believe in you! Know who truly are! We can go back to normal! We can still have a marriage together! But we don't even need guests! Or cake! Or anything! We could be out on the streets and I would still love you! Because you're everything I care about."

"…EvErYtHiNg yOu CaRe aBoUt… EvErYtHiNg… Z-Z-ZeKrOm? I… I dOn'T wAnT tO FiGHt aNyMoRe… I… I… wAnT tO gO bAcK tO nOrMaL…"

Reshiram started slowly walking towards Zekrom.

"No, no, no! This isn't supposed to be happening!" Xaphan screamed.

"Reshiram, I… I love you." Zekrom stated.

"ZeKrOm… I… I LoVe yOu, tOO." Reshiram managed to say.

Zekrom cried tears of joy. "Thank you. We can go back to normal. We can… urgh…" Zekrom muttered, before fainting due to his burn. Reshiram caught him in her arms.

"Why aren't you attacking?!" Xaphan shouted angrily. "You should be totally under my control!"

By now, the burn had worn off on Ethan, Lyra, and Giovanni, with all of them getting up. Giovanni was the first to grab Xaphan by the scruff of his neck before he could escape. "You rotten dirty bastard. You're not getting away."

Lyra quickly got up next, running inside the Pokémon Center to help get nurses for treatment and possible surgery to heal Reshiram.

Ethan was the last to push himself up, using his Pokégear to call the police. "Hello, Goldenrod City Police Department? Could you get over to the back of the city's Pokémon Center as quickly as possible? I have a criminal here that you might be interested in…"

* * *

><p>Fortunately, the police seemed to be competent this time and arrived to arrest Xaphan.<p>

"I can't believe it…" he muttered as he was cuffed. "How could Reshiram have broken through? She shouldn't have! I had complete control! You should all be dead now!"

"I think that's enough, Mr. Xaphan." the Officer Jenny there said, locking him into the back of the police car. Without the cult's leader, and with a police investigation, everything about the cult would collapse and the Johto and Kanto regions wouldn't have to worry about this menace anymore. The cult was finished.

But… one thing still haunted Ethan's mind.

"What about our bargain?" Ethan asked Giovanni. "We never finished our battle."

Giovanni stood silently there for a few moments. Being the leader of Team Rocket, he was surely going to be arrested along with Xaphan. After all, his slavery of Pokémon was a serious crime.

"Ethan… I admire you. I must admit, I've seen you as something like a second son to me. But… a man knows when to fold his cards and admit defeat. I'm no coward, and I'm always a man of my word. Every single Pokémon, both yours and everyone enslaved by Team Rocket… they're all free to go. Team Rocket will fall apart once more without me, so there is no point in keeping them enslaved any longer."

Ethan was speechless. Giovanni was forfeiting? He was letting all of the Pokémon go? It couldn't be true.

Giovanni turned to face Officer Jenny. "I'm well aware that you are going to arrest me as the leader of Team Rocket, and I will face up to my crimes. As for the enslaved Pokémon, my secret base with them is hidden deep beneath Mahogany Town. Free ALL of the enslaved Pokémon. I have no more use for them since I'll be arrested. I may as well save you the trouble."

Even Officer Jenny seemed to be speechless, but quickly recovered herself. "Got that written down." she said, now cuffing Giovanni and opening the police car door.

Giovanni turned to Ethan as he stepped inside. "Ethan. It was nice knowing you." And with that, the car door shut. It then drove off, heading for the police station.

"So that's it, then." Alakazam said. Everyone turned to him. "It's all over. It's all finally over."

"Well… almost." Ethan said, looking at Reshiram. "Even if we've shut down Team Rocket and this cult for good, there are still a few things we need to do."

Walking over to both Reshiram and Zekrom, Zekrom was laid down on the ground, still unconscious. Pulling a Max Revive out from his backpack, he administered it to Zekrom. He woke up shortly after.

"Urgh… huh?" Zekrom stirred, now waking up. "Is it over? Reshiram…" he muttered, still a bit dazed. Seeing the mechanical armor on Reshiram snapped Zekrom out of his daze, however.

"Oh man! That's right! Reshiram, why don't I get that armor off of you? And then we can go home. Finally. Have a happy life together. I'm so glad to finally have this chance after so long…"

Reshiram nodded, walking inside with Zekrom. "I'll give you some anesthesia, and it'll be over before you know it."

Ethan and everyone else followed the duo inside… except for Suicune and Alakazam. "Hey… Alakazam?"

He turned. "Yeah?"

"I… um… I just remembered that promise Entei made for you. That once this was all over, I'd agree to go see Eusine with you. Well… it's all over now. So I'm ready. A promise made is a promise kept."

Alakazam nodded. "Yeah. I'm quite ready to go home after all of this. It's been a long day. I'll teleport you back here when we're done. Let's go."

And with that, they teleported straight to Eusine's house.

* * *

><p>It had been a long day for Eusine, too. When he had discovered his Alakazam had disappeared so suddenly on him, he became worried sick. He had looked all over Celadon City for him for several days, but to no success. He even put up many 'Pokémon Missing' signs, offering an extremely handsome reward of $100,000 if anyone found him.<p>

"Stupid. Stupid. Stupid." Eusine said to himself, deeply regretting his foolish actions from several days ago. He knew that Entei had escaped, and that would've only been possible if he had outside help.

Like from Alakazam.

He shouldn't have been surprised. He WAS keeping the Entei for ransom. Alakazam was probably disgusted with him, and helped Entei out, and probably ran away somewhere. Most likely never to be found by Eusine again. It was only in hindsight and after Alakazam had left him had he truly realized how foolish and selfish he had been.

His obsession with Suicune had gone too far, and it cost him his best friend. He collapsed on his couch after having searched all day.

"Why?" Eusine asked himself. "Why was I so stupid? Why did I keep a Pokémon for ransom? I was just so selfish and blind…"

He closed his eyes, simply resting for the moment… until a flash of light occurred. Opening them, he turned to see what had caused it. And he couldn't believe his own eyes.

"Eusine. I'm back."

There he was. Alakazam. He actually came back. Eusine ran up to him with tears in his eyes, kneeling and facing his head down in shame. He honestly didn't even notice that the Legendary Suicune was only a few feet away as she watched the scene.

"Alakazam. I… I don't know what I was thinking. I was being so selfish and foolish. I wanted Suicune, but my obsession went too far. What I did was wrong. I never thought about your wellbeing or Entei's wellbeing. I… I just… I'm so sorry. I won't ever let my obsession get the better of me ever again. Please. Forgive me."

Alakazam smiled, hugging Eusine back. "I forgive you, Eusine. That's all I need to hear."

"Th-Thank you." Eusine stuttered.

"And Eusine?"

"Y-Yeah?"

"…There's someone I'd like you to meet."

Alakazam released the hug, as Eusine finally took notice of the Legendary Beast of Water. He couldn't believe it. After spending so much time looking for the Beast years prior, the Beast of Water was now staring Eusine straight in the face.

"S-Suicune? That's… that's really you?"

Suicune nodded. "Yes, it is. Pleasure to meet you."

Eusine felt joy flow through his veins at finally meeting Suicune in person for the first time… only to be stopped by a dagger of guilt.

"I… You probably can't forgive me after what you just heard. After I tried to use your brother Entei as ransom for you to come and get him. So that I could capture you. But I see now that I should never try to capture a Pokémon as beautiful and free as you. There's no excuse for what I did."

Suicune smiled softly. "Eusine. While what you did was… inexcusable… we all make mistakes that we learn from. I can tell that you truly are sorry for your actions and what you've done. And I'm not roaming Johto and Kanto anymore. Our trio is back in Ethan's hands and… well, we couldn't be happier."

Eusine smiled as well. "If anyone deserves you, it's a trainer as great as him. I wish all of you guys the best of luck. Oh, and tell Entei… tell him that I'm sorry about everything I did. Uhh, but before you go…"

"Yeah?"

"Do you… do you mind if I take a picture? With me next to you? Just… just something to remember all of this by."

Suicune smiled again. "No. I don't mind at all."

Alakazam smiled as well, speaking up. "I'll go get the camera."

* * *

><p>After a brief moment, Alakazam returned, ready to take the picture. "All right, guys. Smile for the camera."<p>

Both Eusine and Suicune made their best appearance for the camera, with Eusine kneeling to the left of Suicune and petting her mane with his right hand. The camera flashed as both of them displayed genuine smiles, with both of their worries over.

"I hate to interrupt, but I need to get back to Ethan." Suicune stated.

"No worries. I understand. May we meet again someday." Eusine replied. "Alakazam. You know what to do."

"Of course." he nodded. Surrounding only Suicune in a pink light, he teleported her back to the Goldenrod City Pokémon Center, with Alakazam's role in this adventure over.

* * *

><p>Suicune re-appeared at the Pokémon Center, at the back where they had teleported from earlier. Walking inside, she noticed how much darker the sky was, turning into twilight. She made her way back up to where Ethan was staying and where Victor was recovering, with Reshiram now fully recovered from her surgery that Zekrom had done while Suicune was away.<p>

Zekrom smiled. "Good, Suicune. You're here. Before Reshiram and I leave, there are a few things I want to say. Thank you. Ethan, Typhlosion, Buddy, Victor, Raikou… everyone here. I can't thank all of you enough for everything you've done. If it wasn't for you guys, I'd still be part of Team Rocket, and Reshiram… she wouldn't be here with us. All of you had your own vital parts in helping out. And now, not only is the cult and Team Rocket shut down for good… but I also have my beloved back."

Reshiram continued. "Everyone, thank you. Zekrom and I are going back to Unova to get a new start on our life. Good-bye."

Zekrom opened the very large window to the room, which the dragons squeezed through. Together, they soared off into the sunset, ready to begin anew.

Raikou also turned to Ethan. "Ethan. Our trio has decided to stay with you. We want you back not as our trainer, but as family."

Ethan laughed as the Beasts playfully tackled him, happy to be with him once again.

"And… we'd like to be part of your family, too."

Typhlosion and Victor stood up, both of them smiling at Ethan.

"You guys sure?" he asked.

"Ethan, I finally figured out that I was that Cyndaquil that disappeared when you first became a trainer. After all our time together, it just added up." Typhlosion confessed.

"And I'm sticking with Ty as well." Victor said. "I don't have any family to go back to, having lived with Team Rocket my whole life. But I'm willing to be a part of your family, if you'll accept me."

"And uh, we're a package deal." Typhlosion chuckled.

Ethan smiled. "Wow. I'm glad for all of you guys. After all of this craziness, it'll be nice to finally get back to training. I still have Kalos to go explore. And I'd love to see it with you guys. Thank you, everyone."

* * *

><p><em>Pokémon © Nintendo  Game Freak_

And that's it. The finale to this long epic that I'm proud to conclude. To all my long-time readers, thank you for staying with me for so long. I'm so happy to give you the conclusion to the story. I've been writing this one for 3 and a half years, and I'm just so happy to finish it all. Look for more to come.

AuraWielder


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